Brill Tramway
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The Brill Tramway, also known as the Quainton Tramway, Wotton Tramway, Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad and Metropolitan Railway Brill Branch, was a six-mile (10 km) rail line in the Aylesbury Vale
, Buckinghamshire
, England. It was privately built in 1871 by the 3rd Duke of Buckingham as a horse tram
line to help transport goods between his lands around Wotton House
and the national rail network. Lobbying from the nearby village of Brill
led to its extension to Brill and conversion to passenger use in early 1872. Two locomotives were bought but the line had been built for horses and thus trains travelled at an average speed of 4 miles per hour (6.4 km/h).
In 1883, the Duke of Buckingham planned to upgrade the route to main line standards and extend the line to Oxford
, creating the shortest route between Aylesbury and Oxford. Despite the backing of the wealthy Ferdinand de Rothschild, investors were deterred by costly tunnelling. In 1888 a cheaper scheme was proposed in which the line would be built to a lower standard and avoid tunnelling. In anticipation, the line was named the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad.
Although the existing line had been upgraded in 1894, the extension to Oxford was never built. Instead, operation of the Brill Tramway was taken over by London's Metropolitan Railway
and Brill became one of its two north-western termini. The line was rebuilt in 1910, and more advanced locomotives were introduced, allowing trains to run faster. The population of the area remained low, and the primary income source remained the carriage of goods to and from farms. Between 1899 and 1910 other lines were built in the area, providing more direct services to London and the north of England. The Brill Tramway went into financial decline.
In 1933 the Metropolitan Railway became the Metropolitan Line
of London Transport
. The Brill Tramway became part of the London Underground, despite being 40 miles (65 km) from London and not underground. London Transport aimed to concentrate on electrification and improvement of passenger services in London and saw little possibility that routes in Buckinghamshire could become viable passenger routes. In 1935 the Brill Tramway closed. The infrastructure was dismantled and sold. Little trace remains other than the former junction station
at Quainton Road
, now the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre
.
is a small village at the top of the 600 feet (182.9 m) high Brill Hill in the Aylesbury Vale
in northern Buckinghamshire
, 12 miles (19.3 km) northeast of Oxford
, and 45 miles (72.4 km) north-west of London
. It was the only population centre in Bernwood Forest
, a forest owned by English monarchs as a hunting ground. Traditionally believed to have been the home of King Lud
, Brill Palace was a seat of the Mercian kings, the home of Edward the Confessor
, and an occasional residence of the monarchs of England until at least the reign of Henry III
(1216–72). Although a centre for manufacture of pottery and bricks, Brill was a long way from major roads or rivers, and separated by hills from Oxford. It remained small and isolated. In the 1861 census it had a population of 1,300.
seized by bailiffs as security and its contents sold. Over 40000 acres (16,187.4 ha) of the family's 55000 acres (22,257.7 ha) estates were sold to meet debts.
The only property in the control of the Grenville family was the small ancestral home of Wotton House
and its associated lands around Wotton Underwood
near Brill. The Grenvilles looked for ways to maximise profits from their remaining farmland around Wotton, and to seek opportunities in heavy industry and engineering. Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville (titled Marquess of Chandos following the death of his grandfather Richard Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
in 1839) was appointed chairman of the London and North Western Railway
(LNWR) on 27 May 1857. After the death of his father on 29 July 1861 he became 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, and resigned from chairmanship of the LNWR, returning to Wotton House to manage the family's estates. His efforts to pay debts incurred by his father earned praise from Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli, and in 1875 he was appointed Governor of Madras, serving until 1880.
for Buckingham
, Sir Harry Verney, 2nd Baronet
, opened the Aylesbury Railway. Built under the direction of Robert Stephenson
, it connected the London and Birmingham Railway
's Cheddington railway station
on the West Coast Main Line
to Aylesbury High Street railway station
in eastern Aylesbury, the first station in the Aylesbury Vale. On 1 October 1863 the Wycombe Railway
opened a branch from Princes Risborough railway station
to Aylesbury railway station
on the western side of Aylesbury, leaving Aylesbury as the terminus of two small and unconnected branch lines.
Meanwhile, north of Aylesbury the Buckinghamshire Railway
was being built by Sir Harry Verney. The scheme consisted of a line running southwest to northeast from Oxford to Bletchley and a second southeast from Brackley
via Buckingham
to join the Oxford–Bletchley line halfway along its length. The first section opened on 1 May 1850, and the whole on 20 May 1851. The Buckinghamshire Railway intended to extend the line south to the station at Aylesbury but the extension was not built.
On 6 August 1860 the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway
, with the 3rd Duke (then still Marquess of Chandos) as chairman and Sir Harry Verney as deputy chairman, was incorporated by Act of Parliament to connect the Buckinghamshire Railway (now operated by the LNWR) to Aylesbury. The 2nd Duke ensured the new route ran via Quainton
, near his estates around Wotton, instead of a more direct route via Pitchcott
. Beset by financial difficulties, the line took over eight years to build, eventually opening on 23 September 1868. The new line was connected to the Wycombe Railway's Aylesbury station, and joined the Buckinghamshire Railway where the Oxford–Bletchley line and the line to Buckingham met. A junction station
was built. With no nearby town after which to name the new station, it was named Verney Junction railway station
after Sir Harry. Aylesbury now had railway lines to the east, north and southwest, but no line southeast towards London and the Channel ports.
s in Quainton of which the Duke was a trustee. The Duke agreed to pay an annual rent of £12 (about £ as of ), in return for permission to run trains. With the consent of the Winwood Charity the route did not require Parliamentary approval, and construction could begin immediately.
The Duke envisaged a tramway west from Quainton Road railway station
across his Wotton estate. The line was intended for transport of construction materials and agricultural produce and not for passengers. It would not have a junction with the Aylesbury and Buckingham railway but would have its own station at Quainton Road at a right angle to the A&B's line. A turntable at the end of the tramway would link to a spur from the A&B's line. The line was to run roughly southwest from Quainton Road to a Wotton railway station
near Wotton Underwood. Just west of the station at Wotton the line split. One section would run west to Wood Siding
near Brill. A short stub called Church Siding would run northwest into Wotton Underwood itself, terminating near the parish church, and a 1 miles (1.60934 km) siding would run north to a coal siding near Kingswood
. The branch to Kingswood was routed to pass a pond, to allow the horses working the line to drink.
Ralph Augustus Jones was appointed Manager of the project, and construction began on 8 September 1870. Twenty labourers from the Wotton estate who would otherwise have been unemployed following harvest were employed six days a week to build the line, each paid 11 s per week. They carried out all the construction except laying the track, which was by the specialists, Lawford & Houghton. The line was built using the cheapest materials and winding around hills to avoid expensive earthworks. Ballast was a mix of burnt clay and ash. The stations were crude earth banks 6 inches (15.2 cm) high, held in place by wooden planks. As the Duke intended that the line be worked only by horse-drawn carriages
, the line was built with longitudinal sleepers
to reduce the risk of horses tripping. A 13 feet (4 m) diameter turntable was installed at Quainton Road to link the tramway to the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway.
. The only passengers were estate employees and people accompanying livestock.
The Duke and Jones intended to run no more than one train on each section of the line so the line was not built with passing loop
s or signalling. When more than one horse-drawn train or locomotive was in operation, the Tramway operated a token
system using colour coded staffs to ensure only one train could be on a section. Drivers between Quainton Road and Wotton carried a blue staff, those on west of Wotton and the Kingswood siding a red staff.
On 26 August 1871 an excursion ran from Wood Siding to London hauled by the Great Western Railway
(GWR). It carried around 150 people, for a total of 105 passenger fares (with each child counted as half an adult), and was drawn by horses between Wood Siding and Quainton Road and by locomotive from Quainton Road to Aylesbury where the carriages were attached to the 7.30 am GWR service via Princes Risborough to London, arriving at 10.00 am. The experiment was not a success. Sharp overhanging branches posed a danger to passengers and had to be cut back in the week before the excursion. The day was wet and ticket sales were lower than expected. The return from London to Quainton Road was delayed in Slough
, and the excursion arrived back at Wood Siding at 2.00 am.
The surveyors designing the line had worked on the assumption that the wagons would have a load on each wheel of 2+1/2 LT and had designed the line accordingly. As it turned out, the four-wheeled wagons used had an average weight of 3+1/2 LT and each carried 6 – of goods, meaning this limit was regularly exceeded. The coal wagons used on the line weighed 5 LT (5.08 t; 5.6 ST) each and carried 10 LT (10.16 t; 11.2 ST) of coal, meaning a load on each wheel of 3+3/4 LT.
As well as damaging the track the loads strained the horses, and soon the line began to suffer with derailment
s, particularly in wet weather. On 20 October 1871 Jones wrote to the Duke that "The traffic is now becoming so heavy that I would, most respectfully, venture to ask your Grace to consider the subject as to whether an Engine would not be the least expensive and most efficient power to work it."
, at the foot of Brill Hill approximately 3/4 mi north of the town, opened in March 1872. Although it was now a passenger railway, goods traffic continued to be the primary purpose of the line. The line was heavily used to ship bricks from the brickworks around Brill, and cattle and milk from farms on the Wotton estate. By 1875 the line was carrying around 40000 imp gal (181,843.6 l; 48,038 US gal) of milk each year. The inbound delivery of linseed cake to the dairy farms and of coal to the area's buildings were also important. The line began to carry manure from London to the area's farms, carrying 3200 LT (3,251.4 t; 3,584 ST) in 1872. The tramway also opened a cartage business to handle the onward shipment of goods and parcels unloaded at Brill and Wotton stations.
With horses unable to cope, Jones and the Duke decided to convert at least part of the railway for locomotive
s. The lightly laid track with longitudinal sleepers limited them to 9 LT (9.14 t; 10.08 ST), and it was thus necessary to use the lightest locomotives possible. Two traction engine
s converted for railway use were bought from Aveling and Porter
for £398 (about £ as of ) each. They were chosen for weight and reliability, and had a top speed on the level of 8 miles per hour (3.6 m/s). They took 95–98 minutes between Brill and Quainton Road, an average of 4 miles per hour (1.8 m/s). With an unusual configuration in which a flywheel drove chains which in turn drove the wheels, the locomotives were noisy and were nicknamed "Old Chainey" by locals.
The first of the new locomotives, given serial number 807 by Aveling and Porter and numbered 1 by the Tramway, was delivered to Wotton station on 27 January 1872. On the day of its delivery, the now-redundant horses had been sent away. Nobody at Wotton could operate the locomotive so a horse had to be hired from Aylesbury until the driver arrived. After the delivery of the second locomotive on 7 September 1872, all passenger services were drawn by locomotive except on Thursdays, when locomotives were replaced by horses to allow for maintenance. The line carried 104 passengers in January 1872, rising to 224 in April, and 456 in August 1872.
With steam came the need for water. Plans to dig a well near Wotton came to nothing, and the Duke's expedient of drawing water from a pond near Quainton Road did not impress the pond's owner. By March 1872 Jones recorded that "The party to whom the pond near the Quainton Station belongs is making complaints about our having water and I expect he will be using force to prevent our getting any". A wooden water tower was built at Brill station, and a large water tower known as the Black Tank was built in the fork of the main line and Church Siding.
While the engines proved adequate, they were slow. On 6 February 1872, Jones timed one as taking 41 minutes to travel roughly 2 miles (3 km) from Quainton Road to Wotton hauling 42 tons (43 t). They were also low-powered, and when pulling a heavy load their front wheels would lift off the track. The Duke's cost-cutting led to poor maintenance of track and equipment, and the service was often interrupted by derailments and accidents.
In 1876 the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway raised its prices for coal haulage. All coal hauled on the Tramway needed to pass along the A&BR from Verney Junction or Aylesbury and Jones had to raise prices to cover the surcharge or keep prices stable despite the loss of profits. Road-hauled coal from Bicester
was already undercutting the Tramway and the unreliable engines had given the Tramway a poor reputation. Jones kept prices fixed and absorb the increased costs, wrecking the Tramway's already declining business.
In 1873 the 3rd Duke attempted to have the Wotton Tramway recognised as a railway, and William Yolland
inspected the line in April 1873. The Railway Regulation Act 1844
defined minimum standards of travel, one of which was that the trains travel at an average of 12 miles per hour (5.4 m/s), which the Aveling and Porter locomotives could not manage. None of the stopping places had adequate station buildings, and the line had no signals. Yolland permitted the line to continue as a tramway, but refused to recognise it as a railway.
from John Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough
, for his planned Waddesdon Manor
. Jones and the Duke recognised that construction would increase the haulage of heavy goods and that the engines would not cope.
Engineer William Gordon Bagnall
had established the locomotive firm of W. G. Bagnall in 1875. Bagnall wrote to the Duke offering to hire his first locomotive for trials. On 18 December 1876 the locomotive, Buckingham, was delivered. It entered service on 1 January 1877, mainly on the steep section of the line between Wotton and Brill. Although Jones was unhappy with some aspects of Buckingham, he recognised the improvement and ordered a locomotive from Bagnall for £640 (about £ as of ). Wotton was delivered on 28 December 1877 and Buckingham was returned to Bagnall in February 1878.
Buckingham and Wotton were more reliable than the Aveling and Porter engines. With modern locomotives on the Brill–Quainton Road route (the Kingswood branch generally remained worked by horses, and occasionally by the Aveling and Porter engines), traffic rose. The figure for milk traffic rose from 40,000 gallons carried in 1875 to 58,000 gallons (260,000 l; 70,000 US gal) in 1879, and in 1877 the Tramway carried 20,994 tons
(21,331 t) of goods. In early 1877 it appeared on Bradshaw maps and from May 1882 Bradshaw listed the timetable.
Despite frequent derailments, low speed meant Wotton Tramway had a good safety record. The locomotives occasionally ran over stray sheep, and on 12 September 1888 sparks from one of the Aveling and Porter engines blew back into one of the train's cattle trucks, igniting the straw bedding and badly burning two cows. The line had one serious accident, in which Ellen Maria Nickalls, a servant at Wotton House, was struck by a locomotive near Church Siding and killed. The coroner returned a verdict of accidental death, absolving driver James Challis.
s, with frequent stops to load and unload, were timetabled at 1 to 2 hours to make the same journey, slower than walking.
Jones hoped to increase passenger revenue by promoting Brill as a spa. The chalybeate springs of Dorton Spa
outside Brill were known for supposed healing powers, and a resort had been built around the Spa in the 1830s, featuring a modern pump house and eight baths, set in 12 acres (4.9 ha) of parkland. Despite the redevelopment and the building of modern hotels in Brill, Dorton Spa was unfashionable and by the late 19th century was little used. Jones and the Spa's owners hoped Queen Victoria would visit during her 1890 stay at Waddesdon Manor and thus boost Brill as a spa town. Although such a visit was arranged, Victoria changed her mind and visited the spa at Cheltenham
instead. The spa traffic never materialised.
In 1876 Ferdinand de Rothschild began work on Waddesdon Manor, a short distance south of the Tramway's station at Waddesdon (later renamed Waddesdon Road). The top of Lodge Hill, a landmark, was levelled to provide a site and sloping drives were cut into the hill to provide access to the construction site. Transport of materials was by horse, but the contractors had to get enormous stone blocks up the hill. Rothschild's contractors built a line, known as the Winchendon Branch, which turned off the Tramway between Waddesdon and Westcott
stations and ran south to the foot of Lodge Hill. From there a cable tram ran on narrow gauge
rails up the hill to a gully
close to the building site. Materials were hauled along the cable tramway in tubs by a steam powered winch. The Winchendon Branch was hastily and cheaply built; after one of the Tramway's locomotives derailed there on 5 July 1876 Jones refused to allow his engines on it, and from then on materials were hauled along the branch by horses.
The building of Waddesdon Manor generated huge business for the Tramway. Large numbers of bricks from Poore's Brickworks at Brill were shipped. By July 1877 the entire output of the brickworks was going to supply the Waddesdon Manor works, with 25,000 bricks a week being used. Additional bricks were also shipped via Quainton Road , along with 7,000 tons (7,100 t) of Bath Stone
from Corsham
. The manor also required power and in 1883 a gasworks
was built to the west. A siding from Westcott station ran south to the gasworks, to carry coal. Waddesdon Manor chose not to use the Tramway for supplying coal to the gasworks and the siding was abandoned in 1886.
Waddesdon Manor was complete in 1889, 13 years after construction began. The Winchendon Branch closed and the track was removed. The gasworks remained operational, although supplied by road, until its closure during the coal shortage of 1916. It was demolished shortly afterwards. The track of the disused siding remained until at least 1916.
Few records survive of the Brill Brick and Tile Works, as it came to be called, but it was operational by 1895. Jones (1974) says the siding to the brickworks opened with the extension to Brill, implying that Brill Brick and Tile Works existed in early 1872. This is almost certainly incorrect; no mention of the sidings is made in the Duke of Buckingham's correspondence before 1887 and no reference to the Brill Brick and Tile Works exists in any source earlier than 1895. The bricks used to build Waddesdon Manor had to be shipped by road from Poore's to Brill or along the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway from further afield before being sent down the Tramway to the site, implying there was no works capable of making high numbers of bricks along the Tramway.
Brill Brick and Tile Works could not compete with the larger and better-connected brickworks at Calvert
and declined. The brickworks finally closed in the early 20th century. The building was taken over by the W. E. Fenemore workshop, making hay loaders
, before being converted into a timber yard
in the 1920s.
Jones sought legal advice and was told that the Duke would probably win a legal action against the A&BR. The A&BR was in such a precarious financial position that any successful legal action against them would likely have forced the line through Quainton Road to close, severing the Tramway's connection with the national network altogether. Meanwhile local dairy farmers began to switch to beef and butter, causing a drop in milk transport. From its peak of 20,994 tons carried in 1877, goods traffic fell in each of the next four years, dropping to 9,139 tons (9,286 t) in 1881.
Many of the passengers using the Tramway continued their journey by way of the A&BR line; in 1885, 5,192 passengers changed trains between the A&BR and the Tramway at Quainton Road. Jones suggested that the A&BR subsidise the Tramway's service to the sum of £25 (about £ as of ) per month to allow passenger services to continue, but the A&BR agreed to pay only £5 (about £ as of ) per month. By the mid-1880s the Tramway was finding it difficult to cover the operating expenses of either goods or passenger operations.
opened in 1837 , the first railway station connecting London with the industrial heartlands of the West Midlands and Lancashire. Railways were banned by a Parliamentary commission from operating in London itself and the station was built on the northern boundary. Other termini north of London followed at Paddington (1838), Bishopsgate
(1840), Fenchurch Street
(1841), King's Cross (1852) and St Pancras
(1868). All were outside the built-up area, making them inconvenient.
Charles Pearson
(1793–1862) had proposed an underground railway connecting the City of London with the main line rail termini in around 1840. In 1854 he commissioned the first traffic survey, determining that each day 200,000 walked into the City, 44,000 travelled by omnibus, and 26,000 in private carriages. A Parliamentary Commission backed Pearson's proposal over other schemes. Despite concerns about vibration causing subsidence of buildings, the problems of compensating the many thousands whose homes were destroyed during digging of the tunnel, and fears that the tunnelling might break into Hell, construction began in 1860. On 9 January 1863 the line opened as the Metropolitan Railway
(MR), the world's first underground passenger railway.
The MR grew steadily, extending its own services and acquiring other local railways north and west of London. In 1872 Edward Watkin
(1819–1901) was appointed Chairman. A director of many railway companies, he wanted to unify a string of companies to create a single line from Manchester via London to an intended Channel Tunnel
and on to France. In 1873 Watkin negotiated to take control of the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway and the section of the former Buckinghamshire Railway north from Verney Junction to Buckingham. He planned to extend the MR north from London to Aylesbury and extend the Tramway southwest to Oxford, creating a route from London to Oxford. Rail services between Oxford and London were poor, and although still roundabout, the scheme would have formed the shortest route from London to Oxford, Aylesbury, Buckingham and Stratford-upon-Avon. The Duke of Buckingham was enthusiastic and authorisation was sought from Parliament. Parliament did not share the enthusiasm and in 1875 the Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire Union Railway Bill was rejected. Watkin did receive consent in 1881 to extend the MR to Aylesbury.
With extension to Aylesbury approved, the Duke of Buckingham in March 1883 announced his own scheme to extend the Brill Tramway to Oxford. The turntable at Quainton Road would be replaced with a junction to the south of the existing turntable to allow through running of trains. The stretch from Quainton Road to Brill would be straightened and improved to main line standards, and Waddesdon Road and Wood Siding stations would close. From Brill, the line would pass in a 1650 yards (1,508.8 m) tunnel through Muswell Hill to the south of Brill, and on via Boarstall
before crossing from Buckinghamshire into Oxfordshire at Stanton St. John
. From Stanton St. John the line would stop on the outskirts of Oxford at Headington
, terminating at a station to be built in the back garden of 12 High Street, St Clement's
, near Magdalen Bridge. The proposal included a separate set of rails to be provided where the old and new routes ran together, to allow the existing Wotton Tramway to continue to operate independently if it saw fit, but given the Duke's involvement in the new scheme it is unlikely he intended to use this option.
At 23 miles (37 km) the line would have been by far the shortest route between Oxford and Aylesbury, compared with 28 miles (45.1 km) via the GWR (which had absorbed the Wycombe Railway), and 34 miles (54.7 km) via the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway and the LNWR. The Act authorising the scheme received Royal Assent
on 20 August 1883, and the new Oxford, Aylesbury and Metropolitan Junction Railway Company was created, including the Duke of Buckingham, Ferdinand de Rothschild and Harry Verney among its directors. The scheme caught the attention of the expansionist Metropolitan Railway, who paid for the survey. Despite powerful backers, the expensive Muswell Hill tunnel deterred investors. Ferdinand de Rothschild promised to lend money in return for guarantees that the rebuilt line would include a passenger station at Westcott, and that the Duke would press the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway to open a station at the nearest point to Waddesdon Manor. Waddesdon Manor railway station
opened on 1 January 1897.
, nearer the edge of the city. Jones was sceptical and felt that it unlikely to recoup its construction costs.
On 26 March 1889 the 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos died, aged 65. A special train brought his body from London to Quainton Road, and from Quainton he was taken to Stowe for the service, and on to the family vault at Wotton. Five carriages provided by the London and North Western Railway carried mourners to Church Siding, near Wotton Underwood's church. Another carried a company of the Royal Buckinghamshire Yeomanry
, associated with the Grenville family and the upkeep of which had helped bankrupt the second duke. (This second train was delayed on the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, arriving late to the burial.)
The Dukedom was inherited only in the male line. As the 3rd Duke had three daughters but no son, the title became extinct. The 1st Duke was also Earl Temple of Stowe
, a title which descended through heirs of his relatives should the male line become extinct. Consequently, on the 3rd Duke's death this title, with most of the Wotton estate, passed to his nephew William Temple-Gore-Langton
who became the 4th Earl Temple.
By this time construction of the MR extension from London to Aylesbury was underway, and on 1 July 1891 the MR absorbed the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway. Sir Harry Verney died on 12 February 1894, and on 31 March 1894 the MR took over services on the A&BR from the GWR. On 1 July 1894 the MR extension to Aylesbury was completed, giving the MR a unified route from London to Verney Junction. The MR embarked on upgrading and rebuilding stations along the line.
Construction of the route from Brill to Oxford had not begun. Further Acts of Parliament were granted in 1892 and 1894 varying the route slightly and allowing electrification, but no building was carried out other than surveying. On 1 April 1894, the proposed extension to Oxford still intended, the O&AT exercised a clause of the 1888 Act and took over the Wotton Tramway. Jones was retained as general Manager and work began on upgrading the line for the extension.
The Kingswood branch was not included in the rebuilding, and retained its original 1871 track. Two Manning Wardle
locomotives, Huddersfield and Earl Temple, came into use on the line at around this time. Huddersfield had been built in 1876 and originally named Prestwich; Earl Temple was identical to Huddersfield other than having a covered cab. The Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad could not afford the price when Earl Temple was delivered and the Earl bought it with his own money and rented it to the O&AT. In 1895 two new passenger carriages, each accommodating 40 passengers, were bought from the Bristol Wagon and Carriage Company. In 1896 Huddersfield was withdrawn, and in 1899 replaced with a new Manning Wardle locomotive named Wotton No. 2, at which time Earl Temple was renamed Brill No. 1.
The rebuilding reduced journeys between Quainton Road and Brill to between 35 and 43 minutes. From 1895 the Tramway ran four passenger services in each direction on weekdays. The population of the area remained low, and in 1901 Brill had a population of only 1206. Passenger traffic remained insignificant and in 1898 passenger receipts were only £24 per month (about £ as of ).
Meanwhile the MR were rebuilding and resiting Quainton Road station, freeing space for a direct link between the former Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway and the O&AT to be built. A curve between the lines opened on 1 January 1897, allowing through running between the two lines.
With through running between the lines in place, in June 1899 the MR inspected the O&AT's carriages and locomotives, and had serious concerns. The original passenger carriage began as a horse tram and was shabby internally, and unsafe as part of a longer train. The passenger carriage from the 1870s was in a poor condition. The 1895 Bristol passenger carriages were unfit owing to their light construction. Eight of the O&AT's nine goods wagons did not comply with Railway Clearing House
standards and could not be used on other lines. On 4 October 1899 the MR loaned the O&AT an eight-wheeled 70 seat passenger carriage. As this had been built for the MR's standard height platforms rather than the O&AT's low platforms, 80–100 ft (24–30 m) of each platform on the Tramway was raised to standard height to accommodate the MR carriage.
's hut at Brill station. An elderly Brown, Marshalls and Co
passenger coach replaced it, and a section of each platform was raised to accommodate the higher doors of this coach using earth and old railway sleepers.
On 28 March 1902 the 4th Earl Temple died aged 55, succeeded by Algernon William Stephen Temple-Gore-Langton, 5th Earl Temple of Stowe. The Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company, which by now did nothing except collect £600 annual rent from the MR, pay the Winwood Charity Trust rent for their land near Quainton Road crossed by the rails, and pay Earl Temple an annual dividend of £400, remained independent under the control of the 4th Earl's trustees.
engines, although they were not sold until 1911. The heavy D Class locomotives damaged the track, and in 1910 the track between Quainton Road and Brill was relaid to MR standards, using track removed from the inner London MR route but considered adequate for a rural branch line. Following this upgrading, the speed limit was increased to 25 miles per hour (11.2 m/s).
The Kingswood branch was again not upgraded, and still retained its 1871 track. It was abandoned at the end of 1915, and the track removed in 1920. In 1911 Brill Brick and Tile Works closed, and the siding to the brickworks was removed, with the exception of the rails on the level crossing which as of 1984 were still in place, albeit tarmacked over. On the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, Brill became a centre for training cadets, who were housed in Wotton House and ferried in trains of five passenger coaches.
The Metropolitan Railway was unhappy with the performance and safety of the D Class locomotives and sold them between 1916 and 1922. With much of their route close to London now electrified the MR had surplus steam locomotives, and two Metropolitan Railway A Class
locomotives, numbers 23 (built 1866) and 41 (built 1869), were transferred to the route. Built by Beyer, Peacock and Company
from 1864, the A Class had been the first locomotives owned by the Metropolitan (in 1863, the first year of operation, the MR had used engines loaned from the GWR). Although the most advanced locomotives regularly to work the route, the A Class predated all other rolling stock on the Tramway. The two locomotives operated for a week at a time. Occasionally, the MR substituted other similar locomotives.
Four services per day operated, taking around 40 minutes from one end of the other in 1900, falling to 32 minutes by 1931 after the upgrading of the route and the introduction of the A Class locomotives.
On 1 February 1903 Jones retired and control was taken over directly by the Metropolitan Railway. Jones died on 14 April 1909, surviving to see the railway network in the Aylesbury Vale reach its greatest extent.
, had been authorised to build a new 90 miles (144.8 km) line, from its existing station at Annesley
in Nottinghamshire
, south to Quainton Road. Watkin had intended to run services from Manchester and Sheffield via Quainton Road and along the Metropolitan Railway to the MR's station at Baker Street
. Following Watkin's retirement in 1894, the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway obtained permission for a separate station near Baker Street at Marylebone
, and the line was renamed the Great Central Railway
(GCR). The new line joined the existing MR just north of Quainton Road on the Verney Junction branch, and opened to passengers on 15 March 1899. Many of the bricks used in the building of the Great Central Railway were supplied by the Brill Brick and Tile Works and shipped along the Tramway, providing a significant revenue boost to the O&AT.
decided to create a link with the Great Western Railway to create a second route into London. In 1899 the Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
began construction of a new line, commonly known as the Alternative Route, to link the GWR's existing station at Princes Risborough to the new Great Central line. The line ran from Princes Risborough north to meet the Great Central at Grendon Underwood
, about three miles (5 km) north of Quainton Road. The new line was to cross the Tramway on a bridge immediately east of Wotton station, although no intersection was built between the lines. Although the lines did not connect, a temporary siding was built from the Tramway onto the embankment of the new line, and used for the transport of construction materials and the removal of spoil from the works during the building of the new line. Although formally an independent company, in practice the line was operated as a part of the Great Central Railway.
The new line was planned as a through route and was not intended to have any stations of its own, but in 1904 it was decided to build two stations on it. A new station, also named Wotton
, was built immediately to the south of the existing Wotton station. On 2 April 1906 the new route opened to passengers. The two Wotton stations were very close together, and the same stationmaster was responsible for both.
opened, allowing trains from London to Birmingham to bypass a long curve through Oxford. The new line was routed directly through Wood Siding, although no interchange station was built. The GWR ran in a cutting beneath the existing station; Wood Siding station and its siding were rebuilt at the GWR's expense between 1908–1910 to stand on a wide bridge above the GWR's line. The new line included the station named Brill and Ludgershall
, which in reality was considerably further from Brill than the existing Brill station.
With the opening of the new routes, the Tramway for the first time suffered serious competition. Although further from Brill than the Tramway's station, the GWR's station provided a fast and direct route to the GWR's London terminus at Paddington. The Great Central Railway's station at Wotton, and the other Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway station at Akeman Street
, provided fast and direct routes to both Paddington and to the Great Central's new London terminus at Marylebone, without the need to change trains at Quainton Road. In addition, following the end of the First World War motorised road transport grew rapidly, drawing passenger and goods traffic away from the railways. The Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company repeatedly tried to persuade the Metropolitan Railway to buy the line outright, but the MR declined. In July 1923 the O&AT tried to sell the line to the GWR and to the Electric and Railway Finance Corporation, but was rebuffed by both.
(LPTB). Thus, despite Brill and Verney Junction both being over 50 miles (80.5 km) and over two hours travel from the City of London, the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad and the former Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway became parts of the London Underground
network. The locomotives and carriages were repainted with London Transport's Johnston Sans emblem.
By this time, the route from Quainton Road to Brill was in severe decline. Competition from the newer lines and from improving road haulage had drawn away much of the tramway's custom, and the trains would often run without a single passenger. The A Class locomotives were now 70 years old, and the track itself was poorly maintained. Trains once again were regularly derailing on the line.
Frank Pick
, Managing Director of the Underground Group
from 1928 and the Chief Executive of the LPTB, aimed to move the network away from freight services, and to concentrate on the electrification and improvement of the core routes in London. He saw the lines beyond Aylesbury via Quainton Road to Brill and Verney Junction as having little future as financially viable passenger routes, concluding that at least £2,000 (about £ as of ) per year would be saved by closing the Brill branch.
On 1 June 1935 the London Passenger Transport Board gave the required six months notice to the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company that it intended to terminate operations on the tramway.
The last scheduled passenger service left Quainton Road in the afternoon of 30 November 1935. Hundreds of people gathered, and a number of members of the Oxford University Railway Society travelled from Oxford in an effort to buy the last ticket. Accompanied by firecrackers and fog signals
, the train ran the length of the line to Brill, where the passengers posed for a photograph.
Late that evening, a two-coach staff train pulled out of Brill, accompanied by a band playing Auld Lang Syne
and a white flag. The train stopped at each station along the route, picking up the staff, documents and valuables from each. At 11.45 pm the train arrived at Quainton Road, greeted by hundreds of locals and railway enthusiasts. At the stroke of midnight, the rails connecting the tramway to the Metropolitan Railway main line were ceremonially severed.
Following the withdrawal of London Transport services the Metropolitan Railway's lease was voided and at midnight on 1 December 1935 the railway and stations reverted to the control of the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company. The O&AT Board by now had only three members: the 5th Earl Temple, the Earl's agent Robert White, and the former Brill hay-loader manufacturer W. E. Fenemore.
Although at the time of the closure there was some speculation that the O&AT would continue to operate the tramway as a mineral railway, with no funds and no rolling stock of its own the O&AT was unable to operate the line. On 2 April 1936 the entire infrastructure of the stations was sold piecemeal at auction. Excluding the houses at Westcott and Brill, which were sold separately, the auction raised £72 7s (about £ as of ) in total. The Ward Scrap Metal Company paid £7,000 (about £ as of ) for the rails, with the exception of those at Quainton Road which were retained as a siding.
With the stations at Wood Siding and Brill closed, and the GWR's Brill and Ludgershall railway station
inconveniently sited, the GWR opened a new station on the Chiltern Main Line near to Brill at Dorton Halt
on 21 June 1937.
On 5 January 1937 the board of the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad met for the last time. On 5 February 1937 a winding up petition was presented to the High Court, and on 24 March 1937 Mr W. E. Fisher was appointed liquidator
. On 11 November 1940 Fisher was formally discharged, and the O&AT officially ceased to exist.
. Other than the station buildings at Westcott and Quainton Road almost nothing survives of the tramway, although much of the route can still be traced by a double line of hedges. The former trackbed between Quainton Road and Waddesdon Road is now a public footpath known as the Tramway Walk.
After the death of the 3rd Duke of Buckingham the family archives, including the records of the Brill Tramway, were sold to the Huntington Library
in California. In 1968 the London Underground Railway Society launched a fundraising appeal to microfilm the relevant material, and in January 1971 the microfilms were opened to researchers at the University of London Library (now Senate House Library).
In the 1973 documentary Metro-land
, John Betjeman
spoke of a 1929 visit to Quainton Road, and of watching a train depart for Brill: "The steam ready to take two or three passengers through oil-lit halts and over level crossings, a rather bumpy journey".
Wotton station on the Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway, which in 1923 had been taken over by the London and North Eastern Railway
, remained open (albeit little used and served by only two trains per day in each direction) until 7 December 1953, when the line was abandoned. The bridge that had formerly carried the GW&GCJR over the tramway at Wotton was demolished in 1970, and the former GW&GCJR station was converted to a private house.
Both Dorton Halt and Brill and Ludgersall stations were closed under the Beeching Axe
on 7 January 1963 and trains no longer stop, although the line through them remains in use by trains between Princes Risborough
and Bicester North
. Quainton Road station was bought in 1969 by members of the London Railway Preservation Society to use as a permanent base, and now houses the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre
. The station is still connected to the railway network and used by freight trains and occasional special passenger services, but no longer has a scheduled passenger service. There are no longer any open railway stations in the areas formerly served by the tramway. Plans have been proposed by the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre to rebuild and reopen a stretch of the tramway as a heritage railway
.
Aylesbury Vale
The Aylesbury Vale is a large area of flat land mostly in Buckinghamshire, England. Its boundary is marked by Milton Keynes to the north, Leighton Buzzard and the Chiltern Hills to the east and south, Thame to the south and Bicester and Brackley to the west.The vale is named after Aylesbury, the...
, Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....
, England. It was privately built in 1871 by the 3rd Duke of Buckingham as a horse tram
Horsecar
A horsecar or horse-drawn tram is an animal-powered streetcar or tram.These early forms of public transport developed out of industrial haulage routes that had long been in existence, and from the omnibus routes that first ran on public streets in the 1820s, using the newly improved iron or steel...
line to help transport goods between his lands around Wotton House
Wotton House
Wotton House, or Wotton, the manor house in Wotton Underwood , was rebuilt from the ground up between 1704 and 1714, to a design very similar to that of the contemporary version of Buckingham House, as it is known from engravings...
and the national rail network. Lobbying from the nearby village of Brill
Brill
Brill is a village and civil parish in Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England, close to the boundary with Oxfordshire. It is about north-west of Long Crendon and south-east of Bicester...
led to its extension to Brill and conversion to passenger use in early 1872. Two locomotives were bought but the line had been built for horses and thus trains travelled at an average speed of 4 miles per hour (6.4 km/h).
In 1883, the Duke of Buckingham planned to upgrade the route to main line standards and extend the line to Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
, creating the shortest route between Aylesbury and Oxford. Despite the backing of the wealthy Ferdinand de Rothschild, investors were deterred by costly tunnelling. In 1888 a cheaper scheme was proposed in which the line would be built to a lower standard and avoid tunnelling. In anticipation, the line was named the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad.
Although the existing line had been upgraded in 1894, the extension to Oxford was never built. Instead, operation of the Brill Tramway was taken over by London's Metropolitan Railway
Metropolitan railway
Metropolitan Railway can refer to:* Metropolitan line, part of the London Underground* Metropolitan Railway, the first underground railway to be built in London...
and Brill became one of its two north-western termini. The line was rebuilt in 1910, and more advanced locomotives were introduced, allowing trains to run faster. The population of the area remained low, and the primary income source remained the carriage of goods to and from farms. Between 1899 and 1910 other lines were built in the area, providing more direct services to London and the north of England. The Brill Tramway went into financial decline.
In 1933 the Metropolitan Railway became the Metropolitan Line
Metropolitan Line
The Metropolitan line is part of the London Underground. It is coloured in Transport for London's Corporate Magenta on the Tube map and in other branding. It was the first underground railway in the world, opening as the Metropolitan Railway on 10 January 1863...
of London Transport
London Passenger Transport Board
The London Passenger Transport Board was the organisation responsible for public transport in London, UK, and its environs from 1933 to 1948...
. The Brill Tramway became part of the London Underground, despite being 40 miles (65 km) from London and not underground. London Transport aimed to concentrate on electrification and improvement of passenger services in London and saw little possibility that routes in Buckinghamshire could become viable passenger routes. In 1935 the Brill Tramway closed. The infrastructure was dismantled and sold. Little trace remains other than the former junction station
Junction station
Junction station usually refers to a railway station situated or close to a junction where lines to several destinations diverge. The usual minimum is three incoming lines...
at Quainton Road
Quainton Road railway station
Quainton Road railway station was opened in 1868 in undeveloped countryside near Quainton, Buckinghamshire, from London. Built by the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, it was the result of pressure from the 3rd Duke of Buckingham to route the railway near his home at Wotton House and to open a...
, now the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre
Buckinghamshire Railway Centre
Buckinghamshire Railway Centre is a railway museum operated by the Quainton Railway Society Ltd. at Quainton Road railway station, in the far depths of "Metro-land", about 5 miles west of Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire. The site is divided into two halves which are joined by two foot-bridges, one of...
.
Background
BrillBrill
Brill is a village and civil parish in Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England, close to the boundary with Oxfordshire. It is about north-west of Long Crendon and south-east of Bicester...
is a small village at the top of the 600 feet (182.9 m) high Brill Hill in the Aylesbury Vale
Aylesbury Vale
The Aylesbury Vale is a large area of flat land mostly in Buckinghamshire, England. Its boundary is marked by Milton Keynes to the north, Leighton Buzzard and the Chiltern Hills to the east and south, Thame to the south and Bicester and Brackley to the west.The vale is named after Aylesbury, the...
in northern Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. The county town is Aylesbury, the largest town in the ceremonial county is Milton Keynes and largest town in the non-metropolitan county is High Wycombe....
, 12 miles (19.3 km) northeast of Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
, and 45 miles (72.4 km) north-west of London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. It was the only population centre in Bernwood Forest
Bernwood Forest
Bernwood was one of several forests of the ancient kingdom of England and was a Royal hunting forest. It is thought to have been set aside as Royal hunting land when the Anglo-Saxon kings had a palace at Brill in the 10th century and was a particularly favoured place of Edward the Confessor, who...
, a forest owned by English monarchs as a hunting ground. Traditionally believed to have been the home of King Lud
Lud son of Heli
Lud , according to Geoffrey of Monmouth's legendary History of the Kings of Britain and related medieval texts, was a king of Britain in pre-Roman times. He was the eldest son of Geoffrey's King Heli, and succeeded his father to the throne. He was succeeded, in turn, by his brother Cassibelanus...
, Brill Palace was a seat of the Mercian kings, the home of Edward the Confessor
Edward the Confessor
Edward the Confessor also known as St. Edward the Confessor , son of Æthelred the Unready and Emma of Normandy, was one of the last Anglo-Saxon kings of England and is usually regarded as the last king of the House of Wessex, ruling from 1042 to 1066....
, and an occasional residence of the monarchs of England until at least the reign of Henry III
Henry III of England
Henry III was the son and successor of John as King of England, reigning for 56 years from 1216 until his death. His contemporaries knew him as Henry of Winchester. He was the first child king in England since the reign of Æthelred the Unready...
(1216–72). Although a centre for manufacture of pottery and bricks, Brill was a long way from major roads or rivers, and separated by hills from Oxford. It remained small and isolated. In the 1861 census it had a population of 1,300.
Wotton House and the Dukes of Buckingham
Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, the only son of Richard Plantagenet Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 2nd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, was born on 10 September 1823. By the mid-19th century the family was in financial difficulty. The family's estates and their London home at Buckingham House were sold and the family seat of Stowe HouseStowe House
Stowe House is a Grade I listed country house located in Stowe, Buckinghamshire, England. It is the home of Stowe School, an independent school. The gardens , a significant example of the English Landscape Garden style, along with part of the Park, passed into the ownership of The National Trust...
seized by bailiffs as security and its contents sold. Over 40000 acres (16,187.4 ha) of the family's 55000 acres (22,257.7 ha) estates were sold to meet debts.
The only property in the control of the Grenville family was the small ancestral home of Wotton House
Wotton House
Wotton House, or Wotton, the manor house in Wotton Underwood , was rebuilt from the ground up between 1704 and 1714, to a design very similar to that of the contemporary version of Buckingham House, as it is known from engravings...
and its associated lands around Wotton Underwood
Wotton Underwood
Wotton Underwood is a village and civil parish in the Aylesbury Vale District of Buckinghamshire, about north of Thame in neighbouring Oxfordshire....
near Brill. The Grenvilles looked for ways to maximise profits from their remaining farmland around Wotton, and to seek opportunities in heavy industry and engineering. Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville (titled Marquess of Chandos following the death of his grandfather Richard Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
Richard Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
Richard Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Chandos KG, PC , styled Earl Temple from 1784 to 1813 and known as The Marquess of Buckingham from 1813 to 1822, was a British landowner and politician.-Background:Born Richard Temple-Nugent-Grenville, he was the eldest son...
in 1839) was appointed chairman of the London and North Western Railway
London and North Western Railway
The London and North Western Railway was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. It was created by the merger of three companies – the Grand Junction Railway, the London and Birmingham Railway and the Manchester and Birmingham Railway...
(LNWR) on 27 May 1857. After the death of his father on 29 July 1861 he became 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, and resigned from chairmanship of the LNWR, returning to Wotton House to manage the family's estates. His efforts to pay debts incurred by his father earned praise from Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli, and in 1875 he was appointed Governor of Madras, serving until 1880.
Early railways in the Aylesbury Vale
On 15 June 1839 entrepreneur and former Member of ParliamentMember of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Buckingham
Buckingham (UK Parliament constituency)
Buckingham is a parliamentary constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election.-Boundaries:...
, Sir Harry Verney, 2nd Baronet
Sir Harry Verney, 2nd Baronet
Sir Harry Verney, 2nd Baronet PC, DL, JP was an English soldier and Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons variously between 1832 and 1885.-Background and education:...
, opened the Aylesbury Railway. Built under the direction of Robert Stephenson
Robert Stephenson
Robert Stephenson FRS was an English civil engineer. He was the only son of George Stephenson, the famed locomotive builder and railway engineer; many of the achievements popularly credited to his father were actually the joint efforts of father and son.-Early life :He was born on the 16th of...
, it connected the London and Birmingham Railway
London and Birmingham Railway
The London and Birmingham Railway was an early railway company in the United Kingdom from 1833 to 1846, when it became part of the London and North Western Railway ....
's Cheddington railway station
Cheddington railway station
Cheddington railway station serves the village of Cheddington, near Mentmore in Buckinghamshire, England. It also serves a number of surrounding villages, most notably Ivinghoe. The station is 58 km/36 miles north west of London Euston on the West Coast Main Line. It is operated by London Midland,...
on the West Coast Main Line
West Coast Main Line
The West Coast Main Line is the busiest mixed-traffic railway route in Britain, being the country's most important rail backbone in terms of population served. Fast, long-distance inter-city passenger services are provided between London, the West Midlands, the North West, North Wales and the...
to Aylesbury High Street railway station
Aylesbury High Street railway station
Aylesbury High Street railway station was the London and North Western Railway station which served the town of Aylesbury in the English county of Buckinghamshire...
in eastern Aylesbury, the first station in the Aylesbury Vale. On 1 October 1863 the Wycombe Railway
Wycombe Railway
The Wycombe Railway was a British railway between and that connected with the Great Western Railway at both ends; there was one branch, to .-History:The Wycombe Railway Company was incorporated by an act of Parliament passed in 1846...
opened a branch from Princes Risborough railway station
Princes Risborough railway station
Princes Risborough station is a railway station on the Chiltern Main Line that serves the town of Princes Risborough in Buckinghamshire, England...
to Aylesbury railway station
Aylesbury railway station
Aylesbury railway station is a railway station in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, England and is a major stop on the London to Aylesbury Line from Marylebone station via Amersham. It is 37.75 miles from Aylesbury Station to Marylebone Station...
on the western side of Aylesbury, leaving Aylesbury as the terminus of two small and unconnected branch lines.
Meanwhile, north of Aylesbury the Buckinghamshire Railway
Buckinghamshire Railway
The Buckinghamshire Railway was a railway company in Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire, England that constructed railway lines connecting Bletchley, Banbury and Oxford...
was being built by Sir Harry Verney. The scheme consisted of a line running southwest to northeast from Oxford to Bletchley and a second southeast from Brackley
Brackley
Brackley is a town in south Northamptonshire, England. It is about from Oxford and miles form Northampton. Historically a market town based on the wool and lace trade, it was built on the intersecting trade routes between London, Birmingham and the English Midlands and between Cambridge and Oxford...
via Buckingham
Buckingham
Buckingham is a town situated in north Buckinghamshire, England, close to the borders of Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire. The town has a population of 11,572 ,...
to join the Oxford–Bletchley line halfway along its length. The first section opened on 1 May 1850, and the whole on 20 May 1851. The Buckinghamshire Railway intended to extend the line south to the station at Aylesbury but the extension was not built.
On 6 August 1860 the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway
Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway
The Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway was an English railway located in Buckinghamshire, England operating between Aylesbury and Verney Junction.-History:...
, with the 3rd Duke (then still Marquess of Chandos) as chairman and Sir Harry Verney as deputy chairman, was incorporated by Act of Parliament to connect the Buckinghamshire Railway (now operated by the LNWR) to Aylesbury. The 2nd Duke ensured the new route ran via Quainton
Quainton
Quainton is a village and civil parish in Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England, north west of Aylesbury. The population is 1290, of which 1000 are adults. The village has two churches , a school and two public houses...
, near his estates around Wotton, instead of a more direct route via Pitchcott
Pitchcott
Pitchcott is a village and also a civil parish within Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England. It is located about two and a half miles north east of Waddesdon, and four miles south of Winslow....
. Beset by financial difficulties, the line took over eight years to build, eventually opening on 23 September 1868. The new line was connected to the Wycombe Railway's Aylesbury station, and joined the Buckinghamshire Railway where the Oxford–Bletchley line and the line to Buckingham met. A junction station
Junction station
Junction station usually refers to a railway station situated or close to a junction where lines to several destinations diverge. The usual minimum is three incoming lines...
was built. With no nearby town after which to name the new station, it was named Verney Junction railway station
Verney Junction railway station
Verney Junction was a railway station at a junction serving four directions between 1868 and 1968 and from where excursions as far as Ramsgate could be booked...
after Sir Harry. Aylesbury now had railway lines to the east, north and southwest, but no line southeast towards London and the Channel ports.
Construction and early operations
With a railway near the border of Wotton House estate, the 3rd Duke decided to build a small-scale agricultural railway to connect the estate to the railway. His intended route ran on his own land other than a small stretch west of the Aylesbury and Buckingham line. This land was owned by the Winwood Charity Trust, an operator of almshouseAlmshouse
Almshouses are charitable housing provided to enable people to live in a particular community...
s in Quainton of which the Duke was a trustee. The Duke agreed to pay an annual rent of £12 (about £ as of ), in return for permission to run trains. With the consent of the Winwood Charity the route did not require Parliamentary approval, and construction could begin immediately.
The Duke envisaged a tramway west from Quainton Road railway station
Quainton Road railway station
Quainton Road railway station was opened in 1868 in undeveloped countryside near Quainton, Buckinghamshire, from London. Built by the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, it was the result of pressure from the 3rd Duke of Buckingham to route the railway near his home at Wotton House and to open a...
across his Wotton estate. The line was intended for transport of construction materials and agricultural produce and not for passengers. It would not have a junction with the Aylesbury and Buckingham railway but would have its own station at Quainton Road at a right angle to the A&B's line. A turntable at the end of the tramway would link to a spur from the A&B's line. The line was to run roughly southwest from Quainton Road to a Wotton railway station
Wotton railway station
Wotton railway station was a small station in Buckinghamshire, England, built by the Duke of Buckinghamshire in 1871. Part of a private horse-drawn tramway designed to carry freight from and around his lands in Buckinghamshire, Wotton station was intended to serve the Duke's home at Wotton House...
near Wotton Underwood. Just west of the station at Wotton the line split. One section would run west to Wood Siding
Wood Siding railway station
Wood Siding railway station was a small halt in Bernwood Forest, Buckinghamshire, England. It was opened in 1871 as a terminus of a short horse-drawn tramway built to assist the transport of goods from and around the Duke of Buckingham's extensive estates in Buckinghamshire and to connect the...
near Brill. A short stub called Church Siding would run northwest into Wotton Underwood itself, terminating near the parish church, and a 1 miles (1.60934 km) siding would run north to a coal siding near Kingswood
Kingswood, Buckinghamshire
Kingswood is a hamlet of 30 dwellings on the South side of the A41 from Waddesdon to Bicester and between the villages of Ludgershall and Grendon Underwood in Buckinghamshire, England. Kingswood is also a civil parish within Aylesbury Vale district. Parish matters are currently administered via a...
. The branch to Kingswood was routed to pass a pond, to allow the horses working the line to drink.
Ralph Augustus Jones was appointed Manager of the project, and construction began on 8 September 1870. Twenty labourers from the Wotton estate who would otherwise have been unemployed following harvest were employed six days a week to build the line, each paid 11 s per week. They carried out all the construction except laying the track, which was by the specialists, Lawford & Houghton. The line was built using the cheapest materials and winding around hills to avoid expensive earthworks. Ballast was a mix of burnt clay and ash. The stations were crude earth banks 6 inches (15.2 cm) high, held in place by wooden planks. As the Duke intended that the line be worked only by horse-drawn carriages
Horsecar
A horsecar or horse-drawn tram is an animal-powered streetcar or tram.These early forms of public transport developed out of industrial haulage routes that had long been in existence, and from the omnibus routes that first ran on public streets in the 1820s, using the newly improved iron or steel...
, the line was built with longitudinal sleepers
Baulk road
Baulk road is the name given to a type of railway track or 'rail road' that is formed using rails carried on continuous timber bearings, as opposed to the more familiar 'cross-sleeper' track that uses closely spaced sleepers or ties to give intermittent support to taller rails...
to reduce the risk of horses tripping. A 13 feet (4 m) diameter turntable was installed at Quainton Road to link the tramway to the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway.
Opening
On 1 April 1871 the section between Quainton Road and Wotton was formally opened by the Duke of Buckingham in a ceremony in which coal from the first goods wagon to arrive at Wotton was distributed to the poor. At its opening the line was unnamed, although it was referred to as "The Quainton Tramway" in internal correspondence. The extension from Wotton to Wood Siding was complete by 17 June 1871; the opening date of the northern branch to Kingswood is not recorded, but it was not fully open in February 1873. The London and North Western Railway began a dedicated service from Quainton Road, with three vans a week of milk collected from the Wotton estate shipped to the London terminus at Broad StreetBroad Street railway station
Broad Street railway station was a major terminal station in the City of London, England. It opened in 1865 and closed in 1986. It was the main terminus of the North London Railway network of suburban services and was adjacent to station.-Opening:...
. The only passengers were estate employees and people accompanying livestock.
The Duke and Jones intended to run no more than one train on each section of the line so the line was not built with passing loop
Passing loop
A passing loop is a place on a single line railway or tramway, often located at a station, where trains or trams in opposing directions can pass each other. Trains/trams in the same direction can also overtake, providing that the signalling arrangement allows it...
s or signalling. When more than one horse-drawn train or locomotive was in operation, the Tramway operated a token
Token (railway signalling)
In railway signalling, a token is a physical object which a locomotive driver is required to have or see before entering onto a particular section of single track. The token is clearly endorsed with the name of the section it belongs to...
system using colour coded staffs to ensure only one train could be on a section. Drivers between Quainton Road and Wotton carried a blue staff, those on west of Wotton and the Kingswood siding a red staff.
On 26 August 1871 an excursion ran from Wood Siding to London hauled by the Great Western Railway
Great Western Railway
The Great Western Railway was a British railway company that linked London with the south-west and west of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament in 1835 and ran its first trains in 1838...
(GWR). It carried around 150 people, for a total of 105 passenger fares (with each child counted as half an adult), and was drawn by horses between Wood Siding and Quainton Road and by locomotive from Quainton Road to Aylesbury where the carriages were attached to the 7.30 am GWR service via Princes Risborough to London, arriving at 10.00 am. The experiment was not a success. Sharp overhanging branches posed a danger to passengers and had to be cut back in the week before the excursion. The day was wet and ticket sales were lower than expected. The return from London to Quainton Road was delayed in Slough
Slough
Slough is a borough and unitary authority within the ceremonial county of Royal Berkshire, England. The town straddles the A4 Bath Road and the Great Western Main Line, west of central London...
, and the excursion arrived back at Wood Siding at 2.00 am.
The surveyors designing the line had worked on the assumption that the wagons would have a load on each wheel of 2+1/2 LT and had designed the line accordingly. As it turned out, the four-wheeled wagons used had an average weight of 3+1/2 LT and each carried 6 – of goods, meaning this limit was regularly exceeded. The coal wagons used on the line weighed 5 LT (5.08 t; 5.6 ST) each and carried 10 LT (10.16 t; 11.2 ST) of coal, meaning a load on each wheel of 3+3/4 LT.
As well as damaging the track the loads strained the horses, and soon the line began to suffer with derailment
Derailment
A derailment is an accident on a railway or tramway in which a rail vehicle, or part or all of a train, leaves the tracks on which it is travelling, with consequent damage and in many cases injury and/or death....
s, particularly in wet weather. On 20 October 1871 Jones wrote to the Duke that "The traffic is now becoming so heavy that I would, most respectfully, venture to ask your Grace to consider the subject as to whether an Engine would not be the least expensive and most efficient power to work it."
Extension to Brill and conversion to steam
In late 1871 residents of Brill petitioned the Duke to extend the route to Brill and open a passenger service. The Duke agreed; it is likely he had already planned passenger services to Brill, as correspondence from early 1871 mentions passenger facilities at "the Brill terminus". In January 1872 a scheduled passenger timetable was published and the line was named the "Wotton Tramway". (Although officially named the "Wotton Tramway", it was commonly known as the "Brill Tramway" from the time of its conversion to passenger use.) The new terminus of Brill railway stationBrill railway station
Brill railway station was the terminus of a small railway line in Buckinghamshire, England, known as the Brill Tramway. Built and owned by the Duke of Buckingham, it was later operated by London's Metropolitan Railway, and in 1933 briefly became one of the two north-western termini of the London...
, at the foot of Brill Hill approximately 3/4 mi north of the town, opened in March 1872. Although it was now a passenger railway, goods traffic continued to be the primary purpose of the line. The line was heavily used to ship bricks from the brickworks around Brill, and cattle and milk from farms on the Wotton estate. By 1875 the line was carrying around 40000 imp gal (181,843.6 l; 48,038 US gal) of milk each year. The inbound delivery of linseed cake to the dairy farms and of coal to the area's buildings were also important. The line began to carry manure from London to the area's farms, carrying 3200 LT (3,251.4 t; 3,584 ST) in 1872. The tramway also opened a cartage business to handle the onward shipment of goods and parcels unloaded at Brill and Wotton stations.
Locomotive
A locomotive is a railway vehicle that provides the motive power for a train. The word originates from the Latin loco – "from a place", ablative of locus, "place" + Medieval Latin motivus, "causing motion", and is a shortened form of the term locomotive engine, first used in the early 19th...
s. The lightly laid track with longitudinal sleepers limited them to 9 LT (9.14 t; 10.08 ST), and it was thus necessary to use the lightest locomotives possible. Two traction engine
Traction engine
A traction engine is a self-propelled steam engine used to move heavy loads on roads, plough ground or to provide power at a chosen location. The name derives from the Latin tractus, meaning 'drawn', since the prime function of any traction engine is to draw a load behind it...
s converted for railway use were bought from Aveling and Porter
Aveling and Porter
Aveling and Porter was a British agricultural engine and steam roller manufacturer. Thomas Aveling and Richard Thomas Porter entered into partnership in 1862, developed a steam engine three years later in 1865 and produced more steam rollers than all the other British manufacturers combined.-The...
for £398 (about £ as of ) each. They were chosen for weight and reliability, and had a top speed on the level of 8 miles per hour (3.6 m/s). They took 95–98 minutes between Brill and Quainton Road, an average of 4 miles per hour (1.8 m/s). With an unusual configuration in which a flywheel drove chains which in turn drove the wheels, the locomotives were noisy and were nicknamed "Old Chainey" by locals.
The first of the new locomotives, given serial number 807 by Aveling and Porter and numbered 1 by the Tramway, was delivered to Wotton station on 27 January 1872. On the day of its delivery, the now-redundant horses had been sent away. Nobody at Wotton could operate the locomotive so a horse had to be hired from Aylesbury until the driver arrived. After the delivery of the second locomotive on 7 September 1872, all passenger services were drawn by locomotive except on Thursdays, when locomotives were replaced by horses to allow for maintenance. The line carried 104 passengers in January 1872, rising to 224 in April, and 456 in August 1872.
With steam came the need for water. Plans to dig a well near Wotton came to nothing, and the Duke's expedient of drawing water from a pond near Quainton Road did not impress the pond's owner. By March 1872 Jones recorded that "The party to whom the pond near the Quainton Station belongs is making complaints about our having water and I expect he will be using force to prevent our getting any". A wooden water tower was built at Brill station, and a large water tower known as the Black Tank was built in the fork of the main line and Church Siding.
While the engines proved adequate, they were slow. On 6 February 1872, Jones timed one as taking 41 minutes to travel roughly 2 miles (3 km) from Quainton Road to Wotton hauling 42 tons (43 t). They were also low-powered, and when pulling a heavy load their front wheels would lift off the track. The Duke's cost-cutting led to poor maintenance of track and equipment, and the service was often interrupted by derailments and accidents.
In 1876 the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway raised its prices for coal haulage. All coal hauled on the Tramway needed to pass along the A&BR from Verney Junction or Aylesbury and Jones had to raise prices to cover the surcharge or keep prices stable despite the loss of profits. Road-hauled coal from Bicester
Bicester
Bicester is a town and civil parish in the Cherwell district of northeastern Oxfordshire in England.This historic market centre is one of the fastest growing towns in Oxfordshire Development has been favoured by its proximity to junction 9 of the M40 motorway linking it to London, Birmingham and...
was already undercutting the Tramway and the unreliable engines had given the Tramway a poor reputation. Jones kept prices fixed and absorb the increased costs, wrecking the Tramway's already declining business.
In 1873 the 3rd Duke attempted to have the Wotton Tramway recognised as a railway, and William Yolland
William Yolland
William Yolland CB, FRS was an English military surveyor, astronomer and engineer, and was Britain’s Chief Inspector of Railways from 1877 until his death...
inspected the line in April 1873. The Railway Regulation Act 1844
Railway Regulation Act 1844
The Railway Regulation Act 1844 was a British Act of Parliament introduced as a means of providing a minimum standard for rail passenger travel.-The prior situation:...
defined minimum standards of travel, one of which was that the trains travel at an average of 12 miles per hour (5.4 m/s), which the Aveling and Porter locomotives could not manage. None of the stopping places had adequate station buildings, and the line had no signals. Yolland permitted the line to continue as a tramway, but refused to recognise it as a railway.
Improvement and diversification
By the mid-1870s the slow locomotives and their unreliability and inability to handle heavy loads were major problems. In 1874 Ferdinand de Rothschild bought a 2700 acres (1,092.7 ha) site near Waddesdon stationWaddesdon Road railway station
Waddesdon Road railway station, called Waddesdon railway station before 1922, was a small halt in open countryside in Buckinghamshire, England...
from John Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough
John Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough
John Winston Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough, KG, PC , styled Earl of Sunderland from 1822 to 1840 and Marquess of Blandford from 1840 to 1857, was a British statesman and nobleman...
, for his planned Waddesdon Manor
Waddesdon Manor
Waddesdon Manor is a country house in the village of Waddesdon, in Buckinghamshire, England. The house was built in the Neo-Renaissance style of a French château between 1874 and 1889 for Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild . Since this was the preferred style of the Rothschilds it became also known as...
. Jones and the Duke recognised that construction would increase the haulage of heavy goods and that the engines would not cope.
Engineer William Gordon Bagnall
William Gordon Bagnall
William Gordon Bagnall was a British mechanical engineer born in Tamworth, Staffordshire in 1852. He founded the locomotive manufacturing company of W.G. Bagnall in 1875, after working at John Bagnall & Sons of West Bromwich and Massey & Hill's millwrights of Stafford. He died in 1907.-References:*...
had established the locomotive firm of W. G. Bagnall in 1875. Bagnall wrote to the Duke offering to hire his first locomotive for trials. On 18 December 1876 the locomotive, Buckingham, was delivered. It entered service on 1 January 1877, mainly on the steep section of the line between Wotton and Brill. Although Jones was unhappy with some aspects of Buckingham, he recognised the improvement and ordered a locomotive from Bagnall for £640 (about £ as of ). Wotton was delivered on 28 December 1877 and Buckingham was returned to Bagnall in February 1878.
Buckingham and Wotton were more reliable than the Aveling and Porter engines. With modern locomotives on the Brill–Quainton Road route (the Kingswood branch generally remained worked by horses, and occasionally by the Aveling and Porter engines), traffic rose. The figure for milk traffic rose from 40,000 gallons carried in 1875 to 58,000 gallons (260,000 l; 70,000 US gal) in 1879, and in 1877 the Tramway carried 20,994 tons
Long ton
Long ton is the name for the unit called the "ton" in the avoirdupois or Imperial system of measurements, as used in the United Kingdom and several other Commonwealth countries. It has been mostly replaced by the tonne, and in the United States by the short ton...
(21,331 t) of goods. In early 1877 it appeared on Bradshaw maps and from May 1882 Bradshaw listed the timetable.
Despite frequent derailments, low speed meant Wotton Tramway had a good safety record. The locomotives occasionally ran over stray sheep, and on 12 September 1888 sparks from one of the Aveling and Porter engines blew back into one of the train's cattle trucks, igniting the straw bedding and badly burning two cows. The line had one serious accident, in which Ellen Maria Nickalls, a servant at Wotton House, was struck by a locomotive near Church Siding and killed. The coroner returned a verdict of accidental death, absolving driver James Challis.
Passenger services
Jones increased scheduled passenger journeys from two to three each day in each direction. With locomotives generally occupied with goods, many passenger services were drawn by horse. While the increased passenger journeys boosted revenues, the Tramway no longer owned enough horses and had to hire them. By 1881 the passenger service was losing £11(about £ as of ) a month, although reduced use of locomotives lowered maintenance costs. Although reliability had improved, services were still slow. Horse-drawn passenger services took 60–70 minutes to travel six miles between Quainton Road and Brill. The locomotive-hauled mixed trainMixed train
A mixed train is a train that hauls both passenger and freight cars or wagons. In the early days of railways they were quite common, but by the 20th century they were largely confined to branch lines with little traffic. As the trains provided passengers with very slow service, mixed trains have...
s, with frequent stops to load and unload, were timetabled at 1 to 2 hours to make the same journey, slower than walking.
Jones hoped to increase passenger revenue by promoting Brill as a spa. The chalybeate springs of Dorton Spa
Dorton Spa
Dorton Spa is a Chalybeate spring located between the villages of Dorton and Brill in Buckinghamshire, England in a wood called Spa Wood. Chalybeate is defined as "a water or other liquor containing iron", the word's origin is Greek chalyps; chalybos, meaning steel; Chalyps being an ancient nation...
outside Brill were known for supposed healing powers, and a resort had been built around the Spa in the 1830s, featuring a modern pump house and eight baths, set in 12 acres (4.9 ha) of parkland. Despite the redevelopment and the building of modern hotels in Brill, Dorton Spa was unfashionable and by the late 19th century was little used. Jones and the Spa's owners hoped Queen Victoria would visit during her 1890 stay at Waddesdon Manor and thus boost Brill as a spa town. Although such a visit was arranged, Victoria changed her mind and visited the spa at Cheltenham
Cheltenham
Cheltenham , also known as Cheltenham Spa, is a large spa town and borough in Gloucestershire, on the edge of the Cotswolds in the South-West region of England. It is the home of the flagship race of British steeplechase horse racing, the Gold Cup, the main event of the Cheltenham Festival held...
instead. The spa traffic never materialised.
Waddesdon Manor
Westcott railway station
Westcott railway station was a small station built to serve the village of Westcott, Buckinghamshire and nearby buildings attached to Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild's estate at Waddesdon Manor...
stations and ran south to the foot of Lodge Hill. From there a cable tram ran on narrow gauge
Narrow gauge
A narrow gauge railway is a railway that has a track gauge narrower than the of standard gauge railways. Most existing narrow gauge railways have gauges of between and .- Overview :...
rails up the hill to a gully
Gully
A gully is a landform created by running water, eroding sharply into soil, typically on a hillside. Gullies resemble large ditches or small valleys, but are metres to tens of metres in depth and width...
close to the building site. Materials were hauled along the cable tramway in tubs by a steam powered winch. The Winchendon Branch was hastily and cheaply built; after one of the Tramway's locomotives derailed there on 5 July 1876 Jones refused to allow his engines on it, and from then on materials were hauled along the branch by horses.
The building of Waddesdon Manor generated huge business for the Tramway. Large numbers of bricks from Poore's Brickworks at Brill were shipped. By July 1877 the entire output of the brickworks was going to supply the Waddesdon Manor works, with 25,000 bricks a week being used. Additional bricks were also shipped via Quainton Road , along with 7,000 tons (7,100 t) of Bath Stone
Bath Stone
Bath Stone is an Oolitic Limestone comprising granular fragments of calcium carbonate. Originally obtained from the Combe Down and Bathampton Down Mines under Combe Down, Somerset, England, its warm, honey colouring gives the World Heritage City of Bath, England its distinctive appearance...
from Corsham
Corsham
Corsham is a historic market town and civil parish in north west Wiltshire, England. It is at the south western extreme of the Cotswolds, just off the A4 which was formerly the main turnpike road from London to Bristol, between Bath and Chippenham ....
. The manor also required power and in 1883 a gasworks
Gasworks
A gasworks or gas house is a factory for the manufacture of gas. The use of natural gas has made many redundant in the developed world, however they are often still used for storage.- Early gasworks :...
was built to the west. A siding from Westcott station ran south to the gasworks, to carry coal. Waddesdon Manor chose not to use the Tramway for supplying coal to the gasworks and the siding was abandoned in 1886.
Waddesdon Manor was complete in 1889, 13 years after construction began. The Winchendon Branch closed and the track was removed. The gasworks remained operational, although supplied by road, until its closure during the coal shortage of 1916. It was demolished shortly afterwards. The track of the disused siding remained until at least 1916.
Brill Brick and Tile Works
Although Poore's Brickworks was well established, Jones believed there was potential profit in the Duke of Buckingham's capitalising on his access to a railway line by becoming directly involved in brickmaking. Trials with Brill clay in 1883 proved positive, and in April 1885 Jones sought estimates for machinery and labour necessary to produce 10 million bricks a year. It was decided that 5 million bricks per year was a realistic figure, with bricks to be manufactured in kilns between Brill and Wood Siding stations and shipped down the Tramway to the national network. Progress was slow and obstructed by the local authority.Few records survive of the Brill Brick and Tile Works, as it came to be called, but it was operational by 1895. Jones (1974) says the siding to the brickworks opened with the extension to Brill, implying that Brill Brick and Tile Works existed in early 1872. This is almost certainly incorrect; no mention of the sidings is made in the Duke of Buckingham's correspondence before 1887 and no reference to the Brill Brick and Tile Works exists in any source earlier than 1895. The bricks used to build Waddesdon Manor had to be shipped by road from Poore's to Brill or along the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway from further afield before being sent down the Tramway to the site, implying there was no works capable of making high numbers of bricks along the Tramway.
Brill Brick and Tile Works could not compete with the larger and better-connected brickworks at Calvert
Calvert, Buckinghamshire
Calvert is a village in Buckinghamshire, England, near the village of Steeple Claydon.Originally named after a wealthy local family, the village was founded as a hamlet in the Victorian era to house workers for the brick works that were constructed in the area. The works have since been closed and...
and declined. The brickworks finally closed in the early 20th century. The building was taken over by the W. E. Fenemore workshop, making hay loaders
Loader (equipment)
A loader is a heavy equipment machine often used in construction, primarily used to load material into or onto another type of machinery .-Heavy equipment front loaders:A loader A loader is a heavy equipment machine often used in construction, primarily used to load material (such as asphalt,...
, before being converted into a timber yard
Lumber yard
A lumber yard is a retail location for lumber and wood related products used in construction and/or home improvement projects. Lumber yards can also provide services such as the use of a planer and other large machines....
in the 1920s.
Relations with the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway
Although the introduction of the Bagnall locomotives and the traffic generated by the works at Waddesdon Manor had boosted the route's fortunes, it remained in serious financial difficulty. The only connection with the national railway network was by way of the turntable at Quainton Road. The 3rd Duke of Buckingham chaired the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway but its management regarded the Tramway as a nuisance. In the 1870s it charged disproportionately high fees for through traffic between the Tramway and the main line with the intention of forcing the Tramway out of business. Relations deteriorated between Jones and J. G. Rowe, Secretary and Traffic Manager of the A&B. The A&B's trains at Quainton Road would miss connections with the Tramway, causing milk shipped to Quainton to become unsellable, to the extent that Jones began unloading milk at Waddesdon and shipping it to Aylesbury by road. Although Jones asked the Duke to intervene relations remained poor; in 1888 Rowe blocked the telegraph along the Tramway, and in one meeting Jones and Rowe threatened violence.Jones sought legal advice and was told that the Duke would probably win a legal action against the A&BR. The A&BR was in such a precarious financial position that any successful legal action against them would likely have forced the line through Quainton Road to close, severing the Tramway's connection with the national network altogether. Meanwhile local dairy farmers began to switch to beef and butter, causing a drop in milk transport. From its peak of 20,994 tons carried in 1877, goods traffic fell in each of the next four years, dropping to 9,139 tons (9,286 t) in 1881.
Many of the passengers using the Tramway continued their journey by way of the A&BR line; in 1885, 5,192 passengers changed trains between the A&BR and the Tramway at Quainton Road. Jones suggested that the A&BR subsidise the Tramway's service to the sum of £25 (about £ as of ) per month to allow passenger services to continue, but the A&BR agreed to pay only £5 (about £ as of ) per month. By the mid-1880s the Tramway was finding it difficult to cover the operating expenses of either goods or passenger operations.
Oxford, Aylesbury and Metropolitan Junction Railway Company
Euston railway stationEuston railway station
Euston railway station, also known as London Euston, is a central London railway terminus in the London Borough of Camden. It is the sixth busiest rail terminal in London . It is one of 18 railway stations managed by Network Rail, and is the southern terminus of the West Coast Main Line...
opened in 1837 , the first railway station connecting London with the industrial heartlands of the West Midlands and Lancashire. Railways were banned by a Parliamentary commission from operating in London itself and the station was built on the northern boundary. Other termini north of London followed at Paddington (1838), Bishopsgate
Bishopsgate railway station
Bishopsgate station was a railway station located on the eastern side of Shoreditch High Street in the modern London Borough of Tower Hamlets; the western edge of the East End. It was in use from 1840 to 1964 when it was destroyed by fire...
(1840), Fenchurch Street
Fenchurch Street railway station
Fenchurch Street railway station, also known as London Fenchurch Street, is a central London railway terminus in the south eastern corner of the City of London, England. The station is one of the smallest terminals in London in terms of platforms and one of the most intensively operated...
(1841), King's Cross (1852) and St Pancras
St Pancras railway station
St Pancras railway station, also known as London St Pancras and since 2007 as St Pancras International, is a central London railway terminus celebrated for its Victorian architecture. The Grade I listed building stands on Euston Road in St Pancras, London Borough of Camden, between the...
(1868). All were outside the built-up area, making them inconvenient.
Charles Pearson
Charles Pearson
Charles Pearson was Solicitor to the City of London, a reforming campaigner, and – briefly – Member of Parliament for Lambeth...
(1793–1862) had proposed an underground railway connecting the City of London with the main line rail termini in around 1840. In 1854 he commissioned the first traffic survey, determining that each day 200,000 walked into the City, 44,000 travelled by omnibus, and 26,000 in private carriages. A Parliamentary Commission backed Pearson's proposal over other schemes. Despite concerns about vibration causing subsidence of buildings, the problems of compensating the many thousands whose homes were destroyed during digging of the tunnel, and fears that the tunnelling might break into Hell, construction began in 1860. On 9 January 1863 the line opened as the Metropolitan Railway
Metropolitan railway
Metropolitan Railway can refer to:* Metropolitan line, part of the London Underground* Metropolitan Railway, the first underground railway to be built in London...
(MR), the world's first underground passenger railway.
The MR grew steadily, extending its own services and acquiring other local railways north and west of London. In 1872 Edward Watkin
Edward Watkin
Sir Edward William Watkin, 1st Baronet was an English railway chairman and politician.- Biography :Watkin was born in Salford, Lancashire, the son of a wealthy cotton merchant, Absalom Watkin who was noted for his involvement in the Anti-corn Law League.After a private education, he returned to...
(1819–1901) was appointed Chairman. A director of many railway companies, he wanted to unify a string of companies to create a single line from Manchester via London to an intended Channel Tunnel
Channel Tunnel
The Channel Tunnel is a undersea rail tunnel linking Folkestone, Kent in the United Kingdom with Coquelles, Pas-de-Calais near Calais in northern France beneath the English Channel at the Strait of Dover. At its lowest point, it is deep...
and on to France. In 1873 Watkin negotiated to take control of the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway and the section of the former Buckinghamshire Railway north from Verney Junction to Buckingham. He planned to extend the MR north from London to Aylesbury and extend the Tramway southwest to Oxford, creating a route from London to Oxford. Rail services between Oxford and London were poor, and although still roundabout, the scheme would have formed the shortest route from London to Oxford, Aylesbury, Buckingham and Stratford-upon-Avon. The Duke of Buckingham was enthusiastic and authorisation was sought from Parliament. Parliament did not share the enthusiasm and in 1875 the Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire Union Railway Bill was rejected. Watkin did receive consent in 1881 to extend the MR to Aylesbury.
With extension to Aylesbury approved, the Duke of Buckingham in March 1883 announced his own scheme to extend the Brill Tramway to Oxford. The turntable at Quainton Road would be replaced with a junction to the south of the existing turntable to allow through running of trains. The stretch from Quainton Road to Brill would be straightened and improved to main line standards, and Waddesdon Road and Wood Siding stations would close. From Brill, the line would pass in a 1650 yards (1,508.8 m) tunnel through Muswell Hill to the south of Brill, and on via Boarstall
Boarstall
Boarstall is a village and civil parish in the Aylesbury Vale district of Buckinghamshire, about west of Aylesbury. The parish is on the county boundary with Oxfordshire and the village is about southeast of the Oxfordshire market town of Bicester.-History:...
before crossing from Buckinghamshire into Oxfordshire at Stanton St. John
Stanton St. John
Stanton St. John is a village and civil parish in Oxfordshire about northeast of the centre of Oxford.-Manor:The Domesday Book records that in 1086 William the Conqueror's half-brother Odo, Bishop of Bayeux owned the manor Stanton St...
. From Stanton St. John the line would stop on the outskirts of Oxford at Headington
Headington
Headington is a suburb of Oxford, England. It is at the top of Headington Hill overlooking the city in the Thames Valley below. The life of the large residential area is centred upon London Road, the main road between London and Oxford.-History:...
, terminating at a station to be built in the back garden of 12 High Street, St Clement's
St Clement's, Oxford
St Clement's is a district in Oxford, England, on the east bank of the River Cherwell. Its main road, St Clement's Street , links The Plain near Magdalen Bridge with London Place at the foot of Headington Hill at the junction with Marston Road to the north...
, near Magdalen Bridge. The proposal included a separate set of rails to be provided where the old and new routes ran together, to allow the existing Wotton Tramway to continue to operate independently if it saw fit, but given the Duke's involvement in the new scheme it is unlikely he intended to use this option.
At 23 miles (37 km) the line would have been by far the shortest route between Oxford and Aylesbury, compared with 28 miles (45.1 km) via the GWR (which had absorbed the Wycombe Railway), and 34 miles (54.7 km) via the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway and the LNWR. The Act authorising the scheme received Royal Assent
Royal Assent
The granting of royal assent refers to the method by which any constitutional monarch formally approves and promulgates an act of his or her nation's parliament, thus making it a law...
on 20 August 1883, and the new Oxford, Aylesbury and Metropolitan Junction Railway Company was created, including the Duke of Buckingham, Ferdinand de Rothschild and Harry Verney among its directors. The scheme caught the attention of the expansionist Metropolitan Railway, who paid for the survey. Despite powerful backers, the expensive Muswell Hill tunnel deterred investors. Ferdinand de Rothschild promised to lend money in return for guarantees that the rebuilt line would include a passenger station at Westcott, and that the Duke would press the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway to open a station at the nearest point to Waddesdon Manor. Waddesdon Manor railway station
Waddesdon railway station
Waddesdon is a closed station that served the village of Waddesdon and its manor, to the north of Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire, England. The station is not to be confused with Waddesdon Road railway station at the other end of the Waddesdon Manor estate on the Brill Tramway.-History:The station was...
opened on 1 January 1897.
Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad
Despite cash from Rothschild, the company could not raise sufficient investment to begin construction of the Oxford extension, and had only been given a five year window by Parliament in which to build it. On 7 August 1888, less than two weeks before the authorisation was to expire, the directors of the Oxford, Aylesbury and Metropolitan Junction Railway Company received Royal Assent for a revised and cheaper version. To be called the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad (O&AT), the new scheme envisaged the extension's being built to the same light specifications as the existing tramway. To avoid expensive earthworks and tunnelling, the line would parallel a road out of Brill, despite the considerable gradients involved. The entire route would be single track, other than passing places, and the Oxford terminus was to be in George StreetGeorge Street, Oxford
George Street is a street in central Oxford, England. It is a shopping street running east-west. Its eastern end meets Broad Street at a crossroads with Cornmarket Street to the south and Magdalen Street to the north...
, nearer the edge of the city. Jones was sceptical and felt that it unlikely to recoup its construction costs.
On 26 March 1889 the 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos died, aged 65. A special train brought his body from London to Quainton Road, and from Quainton he was taken to Stowe for the service, and on to the family vault at Wotton. Five carriages provided by the London and North Western Railway carried mourners to Church Siding, near Wotton Underwood's church. Another carried a company of the Royal Buckinghamshire Yeomanry
Royal Buckinghamshire Yeomanry
The Royal Buckinghamshire Yeomanry was formed in 1794, when King George III was on the throne and William Pitt the Younger was the Prime Minister, of Great Britain. Across the English Channel, Britain was faced by a French nation which had recently guillotined its King and which possessed a...
, associated with the Grenville family and the upkeep of which had helped bankrupt the second duke. (This second train was delayed on the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway, arriving late to the burial.)
The Dukedom was inherited only in the male line. As the 3rd Duke had three daughters but no son, the title became extinct. The 1st Duke was also Earl Temple of Stowe
Earl Temple of Stowe
Earl Temple of Stowe, in the County of Buckingham, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1822 for the 2nd Marquess of Buckingham. He was created Marquess of Chandos and Duke of Buckingham and Chandos at the same time...
, a title which descended through heirs of his relatives should the male line become extinct. Consequently, on the 3rd Duke's death this title, with most of the Wotton estate, passed to his nephew William Temple-Gore-Langton
William Temple-Gore-Langton, 4th Earl Temple of Stowe
William Stephen Temple-Gore-Langton, 4th Earl Temple of Stowe , known as William Gore-Langton until 1892, was a British Conservative politician....
who became the 4th Earl Temple.
By this time construction of the MR extension from London to Aylesbury was underway, and on 1 July 1891 the MR absorbed the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway. Sir Harry Verney died on 12 February 1894, and on 31 March 1894 the MR took over services on the A&BR from the GWR. On 1 July 1894 the MR extension to Aylesbury was completed, giving the MR a unified route from London to Verney Junction. The MR embarked on upgrading and rebuilding stations along the line.
Construction of the route from Brill to Oxford had not begun. Further Acts of Parliament were granted in 1892 and 1894 varying the route slightly and allowing electrification, but no building was carried out other than surveying. On 1 April 1894, the proposed extension to Oxford still intended, the O&AT exercised a clause of the 1888 Act and took over the Wotton Tramway. Jones was retained as general Manager and work began on upgrading the line for the extension.
Rebuilding and re-equipping by the O&AT
The track from Quainton Road to Brill was relaid with improved rails on standard transverse sleepers. The former longitudinal sleepers were used as fence posts and guard rails. The stations, little more than earth banks, were replaced with wooden platforms. Waddesdon, Westcott, Wotton and Brill were fitted with buildings housing a booking office, waiting rooms and toilets, while Wood Siding station had a small waiting room "with shelf and drawer". Church Siding was not included and was removed from the timetable.The Kingswood branch was not included in the rebuilding, and retained its original 1871 track. Two Manning Wardle
Manning Wardle
Manning Wardle was a steam locomotive manufacturer based in Hunslet, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.- Precursor companies :The city of Leeds was one of the earliest centres of locomotive building; Matthew Murray built the first commercially successful steam locomotive, Salamanca, in Holbeck, Leeds,...
locomotives, Huddersfield and Earl Temple, came into use on the line at around this time. Huddersfield had been built in 1876 and originally named Prestwich; Earl Temple was identical to Huddersfield other than having a covered cab. The Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad could not afford the price when Earl Temple was delivered and the Earl bought it with his own money and rented it to the O&AT. In 1895 two new passenger carriages, each accommodating 40 passengers, were bought from the Bristol Wagon and Carriage Company. In 1896 Huddersfield was withdrawn, and in 1899 replaced with a new Manning Wardle locomotive named Wotton No. 2, at which time Earl Temple was renamed Brill No. 1.
The rebuilding reduced journeys between Quainton Road and Brill to between 35 and 43 minutes. From 1895 the Tramway ran four passenger services in each direction on weekdays. The population of the area remained low, and in 1901 Brill had a population of only 1206. Passenger traffic remained insignificant and in 1898 passenger receipts were only £24 per month (about £ as of ).
Meanwhile the MR were rebuilding and resiting Quainton Road station, freeing space for a direct link between the former Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway and the O&AT to be built. A curve between the lines opened on 1 January 1897, allowing through running between the two lines.
With through running between the lines in place, in June 1899 the MR inspected the O&AT's carriages and locomotives, and had serious concerns. The original passenger carriage began as a horse tram and was shabby internally, and unsafe as part of a longer train. The passenger carriage from the 1870s was in a poor condition. The 1895 Bristol passenger carriages were unfit owing to their light construction. Eight of the O&AT's nine goods wagons did not comply with Railway Clearing House
Railway Clearing House
The British Railway Clearing House was an organisation set up to manage the allocation of revenue collected by numerous pre-grouping railway companies...
standards and could not be used on other lines. On 4 October 1899 the MR loaned the O&AT an eight-wheeled 70 seat passenger carriage. As this had been built for the MR's standard height platforms rather than the O&AT's low platforms, 80–100 ft (24–30 m) of each platform on the Tramway was raised to standard height to accommodate the MR carriage.
Metropolitan Railway takeover
The Metropolitan and the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company were cooperating closely by 1899. Although the line had been upgraded in preparation for the Oxford extension and had been authorised as a railway in 1894, construction on the extension had yet to begin. On 27 November John Bell, Watkin's successor as Chairman of the MR, leased the line from the O&AT for £600 (about £ as of ) a year with an option to buy the line. From 1 December 1899, the MR took over all operations. Jones stayed as Manager. The O&AT's decrepit passenger coach, a relic of Wotton Tramway days, was removed from its wheels and used as a platelayerPlatelayer
A platelayer or trackman is a railway employee whose job is to inspect and maintain the permanent way of a railway installation.The term derives from the plates used to build plateways, an early form of railway....
's hut at Brill station. An elderly Brown, Marshalls and Co
Brown, Marshalls and Co. Ltd.
Brown, Marshalls and Co. Ltd. were a company that built railway carriages, based in Saltley, Birmingham, in the UK. They were formed in 1840. In 1866 they built the original coaches for the Talyllyn Railway, which are still in use, and in 1873 built two bogie coaches for the Ffestiniog Railway....
passenger coach replaced it, and a section of each platform was raised to accommodate the higher doors of this coach using earth and old railway sleepers.
On 28 March 1902 the 4th Earl Temple died aged 55, succeeded by Algernon William Stephen Temple-Gore-Langton, 5th Earl Temple of Stowe. The Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company, which by now did nothing except collect £600 annual rent from the MR, pay the Winwood Charity Trust rent for their land near Quainton Road crossed by the rails, and pay Earl Temple an annual dividend of £400, remained independent under the control of the 4th Earl's trustees.
Rebuilding and re-equipping by the Metropolitan Railway
The MR sold all but one of the dilapidated goods wagons to the Llanelly and Mynydd Mawr Railway, replacing them with five eight-wheeled carriages built in 1865–66. The MR considered the Manning Wardle locomotives unreliable and from early 1903 they were replaced by a pair of Metropolitan Railway D ClassMetropolitan Railway D Class
The Metropolitan Railway D Class was a group of six 2-4-0T tank engines built in 1895 by Sharp, Stewart and Company.- External links :* http://www.railwayarchive.org.uk/stories/getobjectstory.php?rnum=L2597&enum=LE130&pnum=13&maxp=18...
engines, although they were not sold until 1911. The heavy D Class locomotives damaged the track, and in 1910 the track between Quainton Road and Brill was relaid to MR standards, using track removed from the inner London MR route but considered adequate for a rural branch line. Following this upgrading, the speed limit was increased to 25 miles per hour (11.2 m/s).
The Kingswood branch was again not upgraded, and still retained its 1871 track. It was abandoned at the end of 1915, and the track removed in 1920. In 1911 Brill Brick and Tile Works closed, and the siding to the brickworks was removed, with the exception of the rails on the level crossing which as of 1984 were still in place, albeit tarmacked over. On the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, Brill became a centre for training cadets, who were housed in Wotton House and ferried in trains of five passenger coaches.
The Metropolitan Railway was unhappy with the performance and safety of the D Class locomotives and sold them between 1916 and 1922. With much of their route close to London now electrified the MR had surplus steam locomotives, and two Metropolitan Railway A Class
Metropolitan Railway A Class
The Metropolitan Railway A Class were 4-4-0T steam locomotives built to work the first of the London Underground lines. They were built by Beyer, Peacock and Company from 1864....
locomotives, numbers 23 (built 1866) and 41 (built 1869), were transferred to the route. Built by Beyer, Peacock and Company
Beyer, Peacock and Company
Beyer, Peacock and Company was an English railway Locomotive manufacturer with a factory in Gorton, Manchester. Founded by Charles Beyer and Richard Peacock, it traded from 1854 until 1966...
from 1864, the A Class had been the first locomotives owned by the Metropolitan (in 1863, the first year of operation, the MR had used engines loaned from the GWR). Although the most advanced locomotives regularly to work the route, the A Class predated all other rolling stock on the Tramway. The two locomotives operated for a week at a time. Occasionally, the MR substituted other similar locomotives.
Four services per day operated, taking around 40 minutes from one end of the other in 1900, falling to 32 minutes by 1931 after the upgrading of the route and the introduction of the A Class locomotives.
On 1 February 1903 Jones retired and control was taken over directly by the Metropolitan Railway. Jones died on 14 April 1909, surviving to see the railway network in the Aylesbury Vale reach its greatest extent.
New railways through the Aylesbury Vale, 1899–1910
Great Central Railway
In 1893 another of Edward Watkin's railways, the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire RailwayManchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway
The Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway was formed by amalgamation in 1847. The MS&LR changed its name to the Great Central Railway in 1897 in anticipation of the opening in 1899 of its London Extension.-Origin:...
, had been authorised to build a new 90 miles (144.8 km) line, from its existing station at Annesley
Annesley railway station
Annesley railway station was a station in Annesley, Nottinghamshire. It was opened in 1874, to serve the town which had grown following the opening of Annesley colliery in 1865. It was closed in 1953 as part of the post-war cutback, and the line closed to passengers in 1964...
in Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire is a county in the East Midlands of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west...
, south to Quainton Road. Watkin had intended to run services from Manchester and Sheffield via Quainton Road and along the Metropolitan Railway to the MR's station at Baker Street
Baker Street tube station
Baker Street tube station is a station on the London Underground at the junction of Baker Street and the Marylebone Road. The station lies in Travelcard Zone 1 and is served by five different lines...
. Following Watkin's retirement in 1894, the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway obtained permission for a separate station near Baker Street at Marylebone
Marylebone station
Marylebone station , also known as London Marylebone, is a central London railway terminus and London Underground complex. It stands midway between the mainline stations at Euston and Paddington, about 1 mile from each...
, and the line was renamed the Great Central Railway
Great Central Railway
The Great Central Railway was a railway company in England which came into being when the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway changed its name in 1897 in anticipation of the opening in 1899 of its London Extension . On 1 January 1923, it was grouped into the London and North Eastern...
(GCR). The new line joined the existing MR just north of Quainton Road on the Verney Junction branch, and opened to passengers on 15 March 1899. Many of the bricks used in the building of the Great Central Railway were supplied by the Brill Brick and Tile Works and shipped along the Tramway, providing a significant revenue boost to the O&AT.
Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
Following Watkin's retirement relations between the Great Central Railway and the Metropolitan Railway deteriorated badly. The GCR route to London ran over MR lines from Quainton Road to London, and to reduce reliance on the shaky goodwill of the MR, GCR General Manager William PollittWilliam Pollitt
Colonel Sir William Pollitt was general manager of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway from 1886 to 1902, the final three years being as General Manager of the renamed Great Central Railway....
decided to create a link with the Great Western Railway to create a second route into London. In 1899 the Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway
The Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway was a joint venture supported by the Great Western Railway and Great Central Railway and run by the Great Western and Great Central Joint Committee. The original arrangement was agreed between the two companies in September 1898...
began construction of a new line, commonly known as the Alternative Route, to link the GWR's existing station at Princes Risborough to the new Great Central line. The line ran from Princes Risborough north to meet the Great Central at Grendon Underwood
Grendon Underwood
Grendon Underwood is a village and civil parish in Aylesbury Vale district in Buckinghamshire, England. It is in the west of the county, close to the boundary with Oxfordshire and near the Roman road Akeman Street....
, about three miles (5 km) north of Quainton Road. The new line was to cross the Tramway on a bridge immediately east of Wotton station, although no intersection was built between the lines. Although the lines did not connect, a temporary siding was built from the Tramway onto the embankment of the new line, and used for the transport of construction materials and the removal of spoil from the works during the building of the new line. Although formally an independent company, in practice the line was operated as a part of the Great Central Railway.
The new line was planned as a through route and was not intended to have any stations of its own, but in 1904 it was decided to build two stations on it. A new station, also named Wotton
Wotton (GCR) railway station
Wotton was a railway station at Wotton Underwood, Buckinghamshire, on the Great Central Railway's link line between and Ashendon Junction.-History:...
, was built immediately to the south of the existing Wotton station. On 2 April 1906 the new route opened to passengers. The two Wotton stations were very close together, and the same stationmaster was responsible for both.
Chiltern Main Line Bicester cut-off
In 1910 the new Bicester cut-off line of the GWR Chiltern Main LineChiltern Main Line
The Chiltern Main Line is an inter-urban, regional and commuter railway, part of the British railway system. It links London and Birmingham on a 112-mile route via the towns of High Wycombe, Banbury, and Leamington Spa...
opened, allowing trains from London to Birmingham to bypass a long curve through Oxford. The new line was routed directly through Wood Siding, although no interchange station was built. The GWR ran in a cutting beneath the existing station; Wood Siding station and its siding were rebuilt at the GWR's expense between 1908–1910 to stand on a wide bridge above the GWR's line. The new line included the station named Brill and Ludgershall
Brill and Ludgershall railway station
Brill and Ludgershall railway station was a railway station serving the villages of Brill and Ludgershall in Buckinghamshire. It was on what is now known as the Chiltern Main Line.- History :...
, which in reality was considerably further from Brill than the existing Brill station.
With the opening of the new routes, the Tramway for the first time suffered serious competition. Although further from Brill than the Tramway's station, the GWR's station provided a fast and direct route to the GWR's London terminus at Paddington. The Great Central Railway's station at Wotton, and the other Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway station at Akeman Street
Akeman Street railway station
Akeman Street was a railway station at Woodham, Buckinghamshire, where the railway linking Ashendon Junction and Grendon Underwood Junction crossed the Akeman Street Roman road .-History:...
, provided fast and direct routes to both Paddington and to the Great Central's new London terminus at Marylebone, without the need to change trains at Quainton Road. In addition, following the end of the First World War motorised road transport grew rapidly, drawing passenger and goods traffic away from the railways. The Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company repeatedly tried to persuade the Metropolitan Railway to buy the line outright, but the MR declined. In July 1923 the O&AT tried to sell the line to the GWR and to the Electric and Railway Finance Corporation, but was rebuffed by both.
London Transport
On 1 July 1933 the Metropolitan Railway, along with London's other underground railways aside from the short Waterloo & City Railway, was taken into public ownership as part of the newly formed London Passenger Transport BoardLondon Passenger Transport Board
The London Passenger Transport Board was the organisation responsible for public transport in London, UK, and its environs from 1933 to 1948...
(LPTB). Thus, despite Brill and Verney Junction both being over 50 miles (80.5 km) and over two hours travel from the City of London, the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad and the former Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway became parts of the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
network. The locomotives and carriages were repainted with London Transport's Johnston Sans emblem.
By this time, the route from Quainton Road to Brill was in severe decline. Competition from the newer lines and from improving road haulage had drawn away much of the tramway's custom, and the trains would often run without a single passenger. The A Class locomotives were now 70 years old, and the track itself was poorly maintained. Trains once again were regularly derailing on the line.
Frank Pick
Frank Pick
Frank Pick LLB Hon. RIBA was a British transport administrator. After qualifying as a solicitor in 1902, he worked at the North Eastern Railway, before moving to the Underground Electric Railways Company of London in 1906...
, Managing Director of the Underground Group
Underground Electric Railways Company of London
The Underground Electric Railways Company of London Limited , known operationally as The Underground for much of its existence, was established in 1902. It was the holding company for the three deep-level "tube"A "tube" railway is an underground railway constructed in a circular tunnel by the use...
from 1928 and the Chief Executive of the LPTB, aimed to move the network away from freight services, and to concentrate on the electrification and improvement of the core routes in London. He saw the lines beyond Aylesbury via Quainton Road to Brill and Verney Junction as having little future as financially viable passenger routes, concluding that at least £2,000 (about £ as of ) per year would be saved by closing the Brill branch.
On 1 June 1935 the London Passenger Transport Board gave the required six months notice to the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company that it intended to terminate operations on the tramway.
Closure
To fulfil their obligations, London Transport formally inspected the line on 23 July 1935. The inspection was carried out with great speed, the special train taking just 15 minutes to travel the length of the line from Brill to Quainton Road. The inspection confirmed that the closure process was to proceed.The last scheduled passenger service left Quainton Road in the afternoon of 30 November 1935. Hundreds of people gathered, and a number of members of the Oxford University Railway Society travelled from Oxford in an effort to buy the last ticket. Accompanied by firecrackers and fog signals
Detonator (railway)
A railway detonator is a device used to make a loud sound as a warning signal to train drivers. The detonator is the size of a large coin with two lead straps, one on each side. The detonator is placed on the top of the rail and the straps are used to secure it...
, the train ran the length of the line to Brill, where the passengers posed for a photograph.
Late that evening, a two-coach staff train pulled out of Brill, accompanied by a band playing Auld Lang Syne
Auld Lang Syne
"Auld Lang Syne" is a Scots poem written by Robert Burns in 1788 and set to the tune of a traditional folk song . It is well known in many countries, especially in the English-speaking world; its traditional use being to celebrate the start of the New Year at the stroke of midnight...
and a white flag. The train stopped at each station along the route, picking up the staff, documents and valuables from each. At 11.45 pm the train arrived at Quainton Road, greeted by hundreds of locals and railway enthusiasts. At the stroke of midnight, the rails connecting the tramway to the Metropolitan Railway main line were ceremonially severed.
Following the withdrawal of London Transport services the Metropolitan Railway's lease was voided and at midnight on 1 December 1935 the railway and stations reverted to the control of the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad Company. The O&AT Board by now had only three members: the 5th Earl Temple, the Earl's agent Robert White, and the former Brill hay-loader manufacturer W. E. Fenemore.
Although at the time of the closure there was some speculation that the O&AT would continue to operate the tramway as a mineral railway, with no funds and no rolling stock of its own the O&AT was unable to operate the line. On 2 April 1936 the entire infrastructure of the stations was sold piecemeal at auction. Excluding the houses at Westcott and Brill, which were sold separately, the auction raised £72 7s (about £ as of ) in total. The Ward Scrap Metal Company paid £7,000 (about £ as of ) for the rails, with the exception of those at Quainton Road which were retained as a siding.
With the stations at Wood Siding and Brill closed, and the GWR's Brill and Ludgershall railway station
Brill and Ludgershall railway station
Brill and Ludgershall railway station was a railway station serving the villages of Brill and Ludgershall in Buckinghamshire. It was on what is now known as the Chiltern Main Line.- History :...
inconveniently sited, the GWR opened a new station on the Chiltern Main Line near to Brill at Dorton Halt
Dorton Halt railway station
Dorton Halt railway station was a railway station serving the village of Dorton in Buckinghamshire and . It was on what is now known as the Chiltern Main Line...
on 21 June 1937.
On 5 January 1937 the board of the Oxford & Aylesbury Tramroad met for the last time. On 5 February 1937 a winding up petition was presented to the High Court, and on 24 March 1937 Mr W. E. Fisher was appointed liquidator
Liquidator (law)
In law, a liquidator is the officer appointed when a company goes into winding-up or liquidation who has responsibility for collecting in all of the assets of the company and settling all claims against the company before putting the company into dissolution....
. On 11 November 1940 Fisher was formally discharged, and the O&AT officially ceased to exist.
After closure
After closure, the line was largely forgotten. Because it had been built on private land without an Act of Parliament, few records of it prior to the Oxford extension schemes exist in official archives. At least some of the rails remained in place in 1940, as records exist of their removal during the building of RAF WestcottRAF Westcott
RAF Westcott was a World War II Royal Air Force station in Buckinghamshire. It was used by 11 OTU during the war, along with its satellite station RAF Oakley...
. Other than the station buildings at Westcott and Quainton Road almost nothing survives of the tramway, although much of the route can still be traced by a double line of hedges. The former trackbed between Quainton Road and Waddesdon Road is now a public footpath known as the Tramway Walk.
After the death of the 3rd Duke of Buckingham the family archives, including the records of the Brill Tramway, were sold to the Huntington Library
The Huntington Library
The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens is an educational and research institution established by Henry E. Huntington in San Marino, in the San Rafael Hills near Pasadena, California in the United States...
in California. In 1968 the London Underground Railway Society launched a fundraising appeal to microfilm the relevant material, and in January 1971 the microfilms were opened to researchers at the University of London Library (now Senate House Library).
In the 1973 documentary Metro-land
Metro-land (TV)
Metro-land is a BBC documentary film written and narrated by the then Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman. It was directed by Edward Mirzoeff and first broadcast in colour on February 26, 1973...
, John Betjeman
John Betjeman
Sir John Betjeman, CBE was an English poet, writer and broadcaster who described himself in Who's Who as a "poet and hack".He was a founding member of the Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architecture...
spoke of a 1929 visit to Quainton Road, and of watching a train depart for Brill: "The steam ready to take two or three passengers through oil-lit halts and over level crossings, a rather bumpy journey".
Wotton station on the Great Western and Great Central Joint Railway, which in 1923 had been taken over by the London and North Eastern Railway
London and North Eastern Railway
The London and North Eastern Railway was the second-largest of the "Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain...
, remained open (albeit little used and served by only two trains per day in each direction) until 7 December 1953, when the line was abandoned. The bridge that had formerly carried the GW&GCJR over the tramway at Wotton was demolished in 1970, and the former GW&GCJR station was converted to a private house.
Both Dorton Halt and Brill and Ludgersall stations were closed under the Beeching Axe
Beeching Axe
The Beeching Axe or the Beeching Cuts are informal names for the British Government's attempt in the 1960s to reduce the cost of running British Railways, the nationalised railway system in the United Kingdom. The name is that of the main author of The Reshaping of British Railways, Dr Richard...
on 7 January 1963 and trains no longer stop, although the line through them remains in use by trains between Princes Risborough
Princes Risborough railway station
Princes Risborough station is a railway station on the Chiltern Main Line that serves the town of Princes Risborough in Buckinghamshire, England...
and Bicester North
Bicester North railway station
Bicester North is a station on the Chiltern Main Line, one of two stations serving Bicester. Services operated by Chiltern Railways run south to and north to , and .Bicester North is the larger of Bicester's two stations...
. Quainton Road station was bought in 1969 by members of the London Railway Preservation Society to use as a permanent base, and now houses the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre
Buckinghamshire Railway Centre
Buckinghamshire Railway Centre is a railway museum operated by the Quainton Railway Society Ltd. at Quainton Road railway station, in the far depths of "Metro-land", about 5 miles west of Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire. The site is divided into two halves which are joined by two foot-bridges, one of...
. The station is still connected to the railway network and used by freight trains and occasional special passenger services, but no longer has a scheduled passenger service. There are no longer any open railway stations in the areas formerly served by the tramway. Plans have been proposed by the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre to rebuild and reopen a stretch of the tramway as a heritage railway
Heritage railway
thumb|right|the Historical [[Khyber train safari|Khyber Railway]] goes through the [[Khyber Pass]], [[Pakistan]]A heritage railway , preserved railway , tourist railway , or tourist railroad is a railway that is run as a tourist attraction, in some cases by volunteers, and...
.
External links
- Extensive collection of photographs of the Tramway's stations in operation and their sites today
- Newsreel footage of the last day of operations at British PathéPathéPathé or Pathé Frères is the name of various French businesses founded and originally run by the Pathé Brothers of France.-History:...
- Buckinghamshire Railway Centre, based at Quainton Road station