Buckingham railway station
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Buckingham was a railway station which served
Buckingham Buckingham ( ) is a market town in north Buckinghamshire, England, close to the borders of Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire, which had a population of 12,890 at the 2011 Census. The town lies approximately west of Central Milton Keynes, sou ...
, the former
county town In the United Kingdom and Ireland, a county town is the most important town or city in a county. It is usually the location of administrative or judicial functions within a county and the place where the county's members of Parliament are elect ...
of
Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...
,
England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
, between 1850 and 1966.


History


Opening

The first survey of the
London and Birmingham Railway The London and Birmingham Railway (L&BR) was a railway company in the United Kingdom, in operation from 1833 to 1846, when it became part of the London and North Western Railway (L&NWR). The railway line which the company opened in 1838, betw ...
's main line to London plotted a course which ran through Buckingham where a large locomotive and carriage works would have been built. The route was however altered in the face of opposition from the
Duke of Buckingham Duke of Buckingham held with Duke of Chandos, referring to Buckingham, is a title that has been created several times in the peerages of England, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom. There have also been earls and marquesses of Buckingham. ...
who feared for the future of the town, and the line took a new course through
Wolverton Wolverton is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, England. It is located at the northern edge of Milton Keynes, beside the West Coast Main Line, the Grand Union Canal and the river Great Ouse. It is the administrative seat of Wolverton and Gre ...
, opening in 1838. It was to be a further twelve years before Buckingham was connected to the railway, this time on the initiative of the second
Duke of Buckingham Duke of Buckingham held with Duke of Chandos, referring to Buckingham, is a title that has been created several times in the peerages of England, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom. There have also been earls and marquesses of Buckingham. ...
together with local landowner Sir Harry Verney who formed the
Buckinghamshire Railway The Buckinghamshire Railway was a railway company in Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire, England that constructed railway lines connecting Bletchley, Banbury and Oxford. Part of the route is still in use today as the Oxford to Bicester Line. Hist ...
to construct a line between
Banbury Banbury is a historic market town on the River Cherwell in Oxfordshire, South East England. It had a population of 54,335 at the 2021 Census. Banbury is a significant commercial and retail centre for the surrounding area of north Oxfordshire ...
and
Bletchley Bletchley is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. It is situated in the south-west of Milton Keynes, and is split between the civil parishes of Bletchley and Fenny Stratford and West Bletchley. Bletchley is best known ...
. After three years of construction, the single track line opened to passengers on 1 May 1850. The line was initially worked by the
London and North Western Railway The London and North Western Railway (LNWR, L&NWR) was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. In the late 19th century, the L&NWR was the largest joint stock company in the United Kingdom. In 1923, it became a constituent of the Lo ...
(LNWR) which laid on a service of four trains each way daily. At Buckingham, a temporary rudimentary wooden station fronting on to Lenborough Road was used which initially suffered from poor access, being situated almost in the middle of a field along a footpath. This was improved when, in 1853, the station was reached by Chandos Road. The Buckingham Corporation petitioned the railway company to construct a better station which it eventually did in 1861. Designed by
John William Livock John William Livock (30 July 1814 - 15 March 1883) was an architect based in England, best known for his railway stations constructed for the London and North Western Railway. Family He was born on 30 July 1814 in Hampstead, the son of John Li ...
, the new station was constructed in a
doric style The Doric order was one of the three orders of ancient Greek and later Roman architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. The Doric is most easily recognized by the simple circular capitals at the top of col ...
with cornice moulding and
pediment Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pedimen ...
. A new road named "Station Road" was laid from Chandos Road to connect with Gawcott Road to allow passengers to reach the new booking office.


Early years

A number of railway excursions were organised in the early years, taking passengers to destinations such as
Crystal Palace Crystal Palace may refer to: Places Canada * Crystal Palace Complex (Dieppe), a former amusement park now a shopping complex in Dieppe, New Brunswick * Crystal Palace Barracks, London, Ontario * Crystal Palace (Montreal), an exhibition building * ...
via Euston. Initial regular services consisted of five daily trains each way on weekdays and one afternoon service on Sundays. Passengers could travel to London via
Verney Junction Verney Junction is a hamlet in the parish of Middle Claydon in north Buckinghamshire, England. It is on the route of the former Varsity Line. , the line is disused but is scheduled to be reopened by about 2025 as part of the East West Rail proj ...
and Bletchley in around 2.5 hours, the service then continuing on to
Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a popul ...
and
Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...
via
Rugby Rugby may refer to: Sport * Rugby football in many forms: ** Rugby league: 13 players per side *** Masters Rugby League *** Mod league *** Rugby league nines *** Rugby league sevens *** Touch (sport) *** Wheelchair rugby league ** Rugby union: 1 ...
. The completion of the new line south from Verney Junction to
Aylesbury Aylesbury ( ) is the county town of Buckinghamshire, South East England. It is home to the Roald Dahl Children's Gallery, David Tugwell`s house on Watermead and the Waterside Theatre. It is in central Buckinghamshire, midway between High Wy ...
in 1868 opened up the possibility of further destinations. In 1889 the Duke of Buckingham died leaving no male issue meaning that the Dukedom of Buckingham and Chandos became extinct. The family seat at
Stowe House Stowe House is a grade I listed country house in Stowe, Buckinghamshire, England. It is the home of Stowe School, an independent school and is owned by the Stowe House Preservation Trust who have to date (March 2013) spent more than £25m on th ...
was subsequently let to the
Comte de Paris Count of Paris () was a title for the local magnate of the district around Paris in Carolingian times. After Hugh Capet was elected King of France in 987, the title merged into the crown and fell into disuse. However, it was later revived by the ...
, the royalist pretender to the French throne. His residence at Stowe House led the railway company to install bilingual signage at the station as an aid to his staff. In 1898,
W H Smith WHSmith (also written WH Smith, and known colloquially as Smith's and formerly as W. H. Smith & Son) is a British retailer, headquartered in Swindon, England, which operates a chain of high street, railway station, airport, port, hospital and m ...
installed a book stall on the platform, this was subsequently replaced by a Wyman's stall when a change in contract resulted in Smith's moving their business to the town centre. Milk trade was becoming an important source of railway income at the turn of the twentieth century, so much so that a
creamery A creamery is a place where milk and cream are processed and where butter and cheese is produced. Cream is separated from whole milk; pasteurization is done to the skimmed milk and cream separately. Whole milk for sale has had some cream re ...
and milk processing factory was constructed opposite the station to handle the
milk train Rail terminology is a form of technical terminology. The difference between the American term ''railroad'' and the international term ''railway'' (used by the International Union of Railways and English-speaking countries outside the United Sta ...
traffic. The factory's owners changed names several times, being variously known as the Anglo-Swiss Condensed Milk Co., the Condensed and Peptonised Milk Co., Thew, Hook and Gilbey and then later as
United Dairies United Dairies is a former United Kingdom-based creamery, milk bottling and distribution company. The company was formed in 1915 and merged to form Unigate in 1959. During World War I, there were dire shortages of men, horses and vehicles com ...
. In 1915, the LNWR made a number of economies to the line, one of which included the closure of the small
signal box In signal processing, a signal is a function that conveys information about a phenomenon. Any quantity that can vary over space or time can be used as a signal to share messages between observers. The ''IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing'' ...
in the goods yard, 750 yards to the north of the station. The double-track section between the station and signal box - the only doubled section on the line - was severed at the station and a
buffer stop A buffer stop, bumper, bumping post, bumper block or stopblock (US), is a device to prevent railway vehicles from going past the end of a physical section of track. The design of the buffer stop is dependent, in part, on the kind of couplings ...
installed on the down line. The up and down lines were then reconnected by slewing a section of track across.


Decline and closure

Passenger traffic over the line was never particularly heavy, although it was a useful goods route. In the face of increased competition from buses and the private motor car in the 1920s and 1930s, passenger levels declined. By the late 1940s, Sunday passenger services were withdrawn and there were now only four services each way on weekdays. The line was also hit hard by the
ASLEF The Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen (ASLEF) is a British trade union representing train drivers. It is part of the International Transport Workers' Federation and the European Transport Workers' Federation. At the end of ...
strike of 1955 which saw much of the milk traffic lost to road. A form of reprieve came in 1956 when
British Rail British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most of the overground rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the Big Four British rai ...
attempted to reduce losses by introducing lightweight single unit diesel cars (9 up and down daily) in 1956 between Banbury and Buckingham as part of the
1955 Modernisation Plan Events January * January 3 – José Ramón Guizado becomes president of Panama. * January 17 – , the first nuclear-powered submarine, puts to sea for the first time, from Groton, Connecticut. * January 18– 20 – Battle of Yijian ...
. Although this experiment was rewarded by an increase in traffic of over 400%, British Rail nevertheless claimed that the line was uneconomic. The section between Banbury and Buckingham closed on 2 January 1961, leaving Buckingham as the terminus for the branch passenger traffic. Proposals to close the remainder of the line surfaced in September 1963 and a public hearing was held the following October. Passenger services were subsequently withdrawn as from 7 September 1964, leaving the line to Verney Junction open for freight.
Woolworths Woolworth, Woolworth's, or Woolworths may refer to: Businesses * F. W. Woolworth Company, the original US-based chain of "five and dime" (5¢ and 10¢) stores * Woolworths Group (United Kingdom), former operator of the Woolworths chain of shops ...
opened a store in Buckingham in February 1964 and operated a policy of moving their goods by rail. The station's goods yard was soon full of vans carrying the company's merchandise. British Rail nonetheless announced the closure of the branch to Verney Junction as from 11 March 1966, with the line remaining open until 4 April for the purposes of a visit from
the Queen In the English-speaking world, The Queen most commonly refers to: * Elizabeth II (1926–2022), Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 1952 until her death The Queen may also refer to: * Camilla, Queen Consort (born 1947), ...
. The station did eventually close in December 1966. In its last full year of service, the line between Bletchley and Buckingham carried 6,600 passengers, with receipts of £4,000. This amount included 1,000 passengers travelling on
Stowe School , motto_translation = I stand firm and I stand first , established = , closed = , type = Public schoolIndependent school, day & boarding , religion = Church of England , president = , head_label = Headmaster ...
specials, who accounted for £1,250; the remaining 5,600 passengers brought in an income of £2,750, working out at two passengers per train. A
Midland Red Midland RedCompanies House extract company no 82681
Midland Re ...
bus service provided a replacement service between local villages.


Present day

The station buildings have been completely demolished, leaving only the platform edges which remain in a dilapidated state. The trackbed through Buckingham, infilled to platform level, has become a wooded walk.Subterranea Britannica, "Buckingham", 8 September 2008.
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References


Bibliography

* * * {{Closed stations Buckinghamshire Disused railway stations in Buckinghamshire Former London and North Western Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1850 Railway stations in Great Britain closed in 1964 Beeching closures in England Buckingham