13 December 2023 The Railways of Colonel Holman Stephens

Presenter: Chris Jackson

Chris Jackson travelled from London to give an eagerly anticipated talk on The Railways of Colonel Holman F Stephens, the well known pioneer of Light Railways, built and operated on a shoestring.

One of these known as the Selsey Tram ran from Chichester to Selsey (official name - Hundred of Manhood and Selsey Tramway),  a distance of just over 8 miles, operating between 1897 and 1935 and remembered with great affection and amusement until recently by older residents including my late mother.

His presentation explained in great detail the background to what we know as Light Railways, after completion of the core network around 1870.  At this time there were many, mainly rural areas and isolated small towns with no service leading to various pioneers, the best known being H F Stephens working to establish lines both standard and narrow gauge to fill the gaps. The services were built and operated with the utmost economy.

This process gained impetus with the Light Railways Act of 1896 which permitted the building of passenger carrying lines with lighter standards and simplified signalling and infrastructure, subject to 25 mph speed restriction which reduced construction and operating costs.

The Colonel was involved with 16 lines in total either as Engineer or Manager or both. The lines were spread all over the southern half of England and involved civil and operating engineering.

Chris went into some detail about each of the lines which the Colonel was involved with, some were quite obscure and little known about. Others like the Kent and East Sussex Railway survive to this day as a very successful Heritage Line running  standard gauge trains and the Ffestiniog and Welsh Highland Railway which operates as a narrow gauge tourist railway in a spectacular setting, albeit using very different Locomotives and Stock from the original ones used.

It was truly an outstanding presentation by Chris and was attended by 33 people.