The Stourbridge Railway was a small independent railway company in

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 ...

which existed between 1860, and 1870 when it was taken over by 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). The company built a line from 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. ...

(OWWR) at to

Smethwick Smethwick () is an industrial town in Sandwell, West Midlands, England. It lies west of Birmingham city centre. Historically it was in Staffordshire. In 2019, the ward of Smethwick had an estimated population of 15,246, while the wider bu ...

, where it joined the

Stour Valley Line The Stour Valley Line is the present-day name given to the railway line between Birmingham and Wolverhampton, in England. It was authorised as the Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Stour Valley Railway in 1836; the title was often shortened to the ...

Galton Junction Galton Junction is a minor junction on the West Coast Main Line's Rugby-Birmingham-Stafford Line. With Smethwick Junction, it allows northbound trains from the RBS to join the Birmingham to Worcester via Kidderminster Line in a westbound direct ...

History

Opening

The act incorporating the company was passed on 14 June 1860, allowing it to build a three and a half mile long line from Stourbridge Junction to , another act was passed the following year to allow it to reach the Stour Valley Line at Smethwick. The route was open in full by 1 April 1867.

GWR link to Handsworth

The OWWR had come under the control of the GWR by this time, and so in order to integrate the Stourbridge Railway with their system, the GWR constructed a link from the Stourbridge Railway at Smethwick to Handsworth Junction, which was opened at the same time, connecting it to the GWR's

Birmingham Snow Hill to Wolverhampton Low Level Line The Birmingham Snow Hill to Wolverhampton Low Level Line was part of the Great Western Railway's London Paddington to Birkenhead Woodside route. As the name suggests, it ran between Birmingham Snow Hill and Wolverhampton Low Level in England. ...

, allowing trains to run into Snow Hill station. The running of the line was also taken over by the GWR.

Merger with the GWR

The Stourbridge Railway was formally merged with the GWR in 1870 after it emerged that the company's director W. T. Adcock had fraudulently issued stock.

The route today

The line still functions today as part of the

Birmingham to Worcester via Kidderminster Line The Birmingham to Worcester via Kidderminster line is a railway line which runs from Birmingham Snow Hill to Worcester via Stourbridge and Kidderminster in the West Midlands, England. It is one of the Snow Hill Lines, with trains operated by W ...

References

John Speller's Web Pages - Stourbridge Railway
* {{cite book , last = Boynton , first = John , year = 1997 , title = Rails Through The Hills, Birmingham-Stourbridge-Worcester-Malvern-Hereford , publisher = Mid England Books , isbn = 0-9522248-2-8 Early British railway companies Great Western Railway constituents Railway companies established in 1860 Railway lines opened in 1867 Railway companies disestablished in 1870