The Shipston-on-Stour branch was a -long single-track branch railway line that ran between a junction near

Moreton-in-Marsh Moreton-in-Marsh is a market town in the Evenlode Valley, within the Cotswolds district and Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in Gloucestershire, England. The town stands at the crossroads of the Fosse Way Roman road (now the A429) and the ...

, on the present day

Cotswold Line The Cotswold Line is an railway line between and in England. History Early years The line between Oxford and Worcester was built under an 1845 Act of Parliament and opened in 1851 as part of the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway. ...

, to

Shipston-on-Stour Shipston-on-Stour is a town and civil parish in the Stratford-on-Avon District in Warwickshire, England. It is located on the banks of the River Stour, south-southeast of Stratford-upon-Avon, 10 miles (16 km) north-northwest of Chipping Norto ...

, via two intermediate stations, , and .

History

The line started life as part of the horse-drawn Stratford and Moreton Tramway that ran between Moreton-in-Marsh and Stratford-Upon-Avon, with a branch to

, which opened on 11 April 1836. The

Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway The Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway (OW&WR) was a railway company in England. It built a line from Wolvercot JunctionThe nearby settlement is spelt ''Wolvercote'' and a later station on the LNWR Bicester line follows that spelling. ...

(OW&WR) arrived at

in 1853, and they took over the tramway on a lease. The OW&WR upgraded the line to carry main-line wagons, but because the original authorising legislation prohibited the use of steam, it remained horse powered. In 1863, the

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...

(GWR) took over the line, and in the 1880s set about converting the southern part of the route from Moreton-in-Marsh to Shipston-on-Stour into a steam operated railway, with the remainder of the route to Stratford allowed to fall into disuse. In order to do this, a new south facing spur had to be constructed near Longdon Road in 1882 to allow trains from Shipston to run south, as previously there was only a north-facing connection to the branch from the Stratford direction. The GWR obtained powers to allow the use of

steam locomotive A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, oil or, rarely, wood) to heat water in the locomot ...

s on the line, and finally it was reopened as a steam operated branch on 1 July 1889. Passenger services ended on 8 July 1929 and goods services on 2 May 1960.

Operations

The line was

single track Single may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Single (music), a song release Songs * "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004 * "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008 * "Single" (William Wei song), 2016 * "Single", by ...

throughout, without any

passing loop A passing loop (UK usage) or passing siding (North America) (also called a crossing loop, crossing place, refuge loop or, colloquially, a hole) is a place on a single line railway or tramway, often located at or near a station, where trains or ...

s, and so it was operated on the '

One Engine in Steam In railway signalling, a token is a physical object which a train driver is required to have or see before entering onto a particular section of single track. The token is clearly endorsed with the names of the section it belongs to. A token sys ...

' principle, with only one train allowed on the branch at any one time. The branch had sharp curves and was steeply graded, and so had stiff speed restrictions, with passenger trains taking 45 minutes to run the 9 miles from Moreton to Shipston. There were originally four passenger trains, and one goods train per day. From 1922 this was reduced to three passenger trains, until the service was withdrawn and replaced by

bus A bus (contracted from omnibus, with variants multibus, motorbus, autobus, etc.) is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for cha ...

es in 1929. The daily goods service continued until the late 1940s when it was reduced to running several times per week, until it was withdrawn in 1960.

References

{{reflist

External links

Line on warwickshirerailways.com
Closed railway lines in the West Midlands (region) Rail transport in Warwickshire Shipston-on-Stour Moreton-in-Marsh Great Western Railway