North Staffordshire Railway (Part 3)

By TVY Thames Valley | 2024-05-21

Brian Sullivan returned to give us a further selection of the historic photos taken by Tommy Tomalin. This talk covered the North Staffs lines that ran from Stoke-on-Trent to Stone, where two stations still exist at Wedgwood and Barlaston which are currently "mothballed". Passengers having to use a rail replacement bus which has been in place for a number of years. Heading South from Stone we travelled along with the original North Staffs line joining the LNWR at Norton Bridge, before taking the newer "cut off" line, also with a junction with the LNWR at Colwich. This had a number of now closed intermediate stations including Hixon which was the site of the January 1968 level crossing accident in which 11 people died. We also looked at the Trentham Gardens branch which left the Stone to Stoke line at Trentham Junction two and a half miles South of Stoke. This line opened in 1910, and even though it was only a little over one mile in length, it still managed to have an intermediate station at Hanford Road.

We then turned West at Stoke and run via Newcastle-under-Lyme and Keele to Market Drayton to meet the GWR. In the early 1900s the North Staffs built many stations along this line, many only surviving for a few years before closure. A number of these stations did not exist long enough to have any known photos taken. However, this line also had several coal mines along its route, the last of which Silverdale did not close until 1998. In 1962 British Rail constructed an additional cord linking this line with the West Coast Main Line at Madeley, thus allowing better access for coal traffic to the West Midlands power stations.

We also looked at the Leek Brook Junction to Stoke line, via Milton Junction.. We finished the evening with a journey from Milton Junction to Congleton via the Biddulph Valley. On this route Brian showed us several images taken from a brake van on a freight train which by Tommy Tomalin had managed to arrange.

We now look forward to seeing Brian come back to give us the North Staffs Railway (Part 4) in 2025.

Posted in TVY Meeting Report