Beattie 2-2-2 tank circa 1860

West Moors
Railway History: Early Operating Details
Index
 ... LOCOMOTIVES, FOOTPLATE CONDITIONS & SPEED:

Steam locomotives were pioneered in Britain and steam-hauled trains became the predominant mode of travel (apart from purely local movements) by the middle of the nineteenth century, rapidly displacing the horse-drawn stage-coach & canal traffic and hastening the demise of coastal shipping for delivery of such bulk goods as coal, iron ore, grain, ballast etc. The horse was still needed of course as "local feeders" and personal transport, where people could afford same. Many employees of the erstwhile stage coach companies found themselves new employment on the burgeoning railway network; indeed, they were ideally suited to the work, whether in management or employed on the 'operations' side - having the same sense of company loyalty, requirement to follow a timetable, and for the footplate staff, the ability to withstand extreme weather!
 The fundamentals of steam locomotive power had been laid down by ~1835, just over a decade before the local railway arrived here in east Dorset. The engines that first moved across what became Station Road (what did the locals call this track-way I wonder?) would have looked most odd: a single-pair of driving wheels, some 7 to 8ft 6" in diameter (i.e. taller by some margin than an adult male); the engine had an open cab with no protection whatsoever for the driver and fireman - this would not really come into general use until the end of the 19th century. The best that was offered was just a forward-facing 'spectacle plate' for the driver to peer through & in fact this was not universal on engines until the latter half of the 1850s. Enginemen, firemen & guards were expected to 'rough it', much as they had done on the stage coaches they displaced. The fuel incidentally was initially coke, not coal. Beattie_2-2-2_tank
 
Braking was indifferent (acting on the engine's tender only, no brakes on the locomotive proper), but then speeds were not high: 60 m.p.h. was regarded as astounding in the 1840s & much of the 1850s, and the more usual 'cruising' speeds for the 'best' express trains would be around 40 or 50 m.p.h; mixed traffic units no more that 25 m.p.h., and slow/stopping or 'parliamentary' trains were generally run at around 16 m.p.h: goods trains were typically also restricted to that average speed. 		 
On our particular segment of the line, using the 1857 timetabled times for passenger trains between Ringwood & Wimborne (9¾ miles covered in approximately 20 minutes), the average speed over this section was ~ 30 m.p.h. so allowing for the speeding up / slowing down profile, this implies 'top' speeds of no more than 40 m.p.h.
 
Engines of the London & South-Western Railway (L&SWR), who operated the line, even in the early days when they legally didn't own it, were painted 'Bottle Green' or 'Holly Green' at the start of operations on the line, but not many years after initial operations, the livery changed to a red variant, which was apparently closer to a brown hue, and by 1865, variants of 'brown' (e.g. Chocolate, Purple Brown & Umber) were used for the locomotives until well into the 1880s.

Crossing-keepers were expected, effectively, to be always on duty - relief would only be found for long-term sickness. If the designated crossing-keeper was incapacitated for short periods, then his wife would take over - being very much to the advantage of the family that they didn't lose the use of the house provided. All this would not have seemed odd at the time; long-hours and being 'tied' to the company until unable to work was considered quite normal.

double-chimney

Footplate & 'running' staff, as others on the railway, would have worked very long hours by our standards. 12 hour overall shifts were usual (though driving probably down to ~9 hours per shift), and for 6 days a week too. It would be normal practice for a driver and fireman to remain with just one engine, no-one else operating the locomotive, so great pride was established by footplate crews in their locomotives and it was this that gave the early enginemen such a high status. This method of working would not change until the early part of the twentieth century, when the 8 hour day, 48 hour week was introduced.
 ... CARRIAGES & WAGONS:

A farm worker pausing from his labour in the fields along Mannington Brook to watch an early train would be forgiven in thinking that he was watching a stage coach glide by, followed by a cattle truck and an open farm cart! Carriages were very basic - third class passengers were expected to travel (as were the crew as noted above) open to the elements on essentially an open wagon. Very soon after opening of this line though, 'parliamentary' trains would have provided third class passengers with some cover from the elements - though they might not have been able to see much! Even second class was hardly plush, being essentially a 'upgraded' form of third class. Only in 'First' could the better-off classes be assured of some comfort, which would have included rudimentary lighting (oil lamps), reasonably soft seating and full protection from the elements. Indeed, because the line between Southampton & Dorchester was a full 'main line' at this time, some of the best carriages for First Class passengers were to be found passing through the hamlet. Typical capacity of a First-class carriage at this time was around 18.

As to livery; no doubt it was several years before a uniform colour scheme was adopted, but around this time passenger carriages were finished in a dark-brown, with the upper panels picked-out in salmon pink. Goods trucks were generally all-over reddish-brown.

  LSWR early carriage set
 
The starting and stopping of trains was the cause of much discomfort for all passengers with poor coupling links and little to 'buffer' the individual carriages against the movement of the train. Eventually though, sprung undercarriages were provided as well as spring buffers - as an interim measure, some companies had used buffers covered with thick pads encased in leather. No lavatory facilities (hence often lengthy stops at major stations along the way); toilet facilities on trains would not become generally available until the latter end of the 19th century.
 ... SIGNALLING, CONTROL & SAFETY:

When the line opened, the very basic signalling infrastructure was either in place and operational, or on the ground ready to be erected. However, it is important to remember that at this time (1847) operational control of the railway was really just an extension of the way that stage coaches would run on the turnpike highways of Britain. A timetable was established, and the driver, crossing & station staff would follow the timing set down therein ('time interval' control). Visual look-out by the footplate staff was required to make sure they didn't run into a stalled earlier train or other obstruction, and as speed of travel was relatively modest, this was just about acceptable by day. By night, the situation was much more hazardous as lighting on trains was poor. In addition, the guard, as on the stage coaches, was expected to look out & 'guard' the train. He was often housed in a raised part of the carriage to see ahead, and on the earliest trains the guard was outside, riding much as he would have done on a stage coach. He could apply the brake independently if he saw problems. This method of controlling trains was common during the 1830s and 1840s. Also, the guard had to be aware if any of the passengers signalled an alarm, but this was very hit and miss: communication cords (or similar) were many years in the future. The early uniform for guards, by the way, was blue with scarlet collars, with the blue trousers having a double row of scarlet piping. There was also a belt to carry pouches for fog signals, watches etc.

As already noted above, at the time of opening of the railway, braking procedure on trains was rudimentary, and only changed slowly over the following two-to-three decades: for example the standard method of bringing a train to a halt was for the driver to see the need for a halt, apply the tender brakes (the engine did not have brakes remember), and whistle to the guard to apply his brakes - these latter were in fact the most efficient of the set - the tender brakes were often poor in these early days. However, the L & SWR were in the vanguard of development of 'continuous' train braking, where brakes were provided to the carriage wheels and applied in unison, though in the 1850s these were mechanical rather than air / vacuum brakes. It would not be until as late as the 1890s that the majority of trains would have the continuous air brake systems with which we are familiar.

The trains were controlled over the single line by means of passing loops and the timetable - a train in one direction had to be physically waiting in the loop, before the reverse-direction train was released. The electric telegraph wasn't in use along the line on first opening, though the poles to carry the telegraph lines had been put in place, at least over the Southampton [Blechendyn, later West] to Ringwood section. However, not long after the line's opening, accidents occurred, where there was confusion when sending out relief engines / trains to assist breakdowns, derailments etc. There was no way for one station to communicate to the adjacent stations, short of sending men on horses - a slow method of contact, particularly at night & in winter at any time.

Work to complete the inter-station telegraph system was hastened and was completed by the end of 1847, however the railways, although 'hosting' the telegraph lines and operators (at stations) did not use the telegraph to full benefit: that would come about 20 years later with the establishment of signal boxes and box-to-box telegraphic indication. Signalling was very basic - the block system was not in common use until the 1860s, and safety, such as it was, depended upon drivers & station-masters following the strict timetables to avoid one train running into the back of another. There was resistance to safety measures (signalling, block working, dedicated staff in signal boxes etc.), for a long time, not just from operators, but even from those charged with enforcing safety on the railway: it was thought that the more 'safety checks' were introduced, the less punctilious running staff would be in keeping watch. It needed a series of bad accidents in the mid-19th century for things to change.
 
 EarlySignalsLSWR
  This diagram shows (roughly) what the early 'disk' signal, and the later 'semaphore' signals (introduced steadily during the 1860s) would have looked like and what they meant. From sight of contemporary drawings etc., the disk signals were of considerable height, perhaps as much as twice the height of later, more conventional semaphore signals. They are shown as having stout guy-wires running from the ground to a point roughly two-thirds up the post; the signal at Wimborne for example towers over the adjacent early station building by some margin.
 ... PERMANENT WAY, INFRASTRUCTURE ETC:

Early rails were made of wrought iron; only during the 1860s did steel come to be regarded as better (and cheaper), but as late as the 1890s, iron rails could be found on branch lines across the country. Length of rails on the L & SWR in the 1860s were around 21-24ft; by the 1880s up to 30ft and by 1903 45ft. The rails were laid on longitudinal lengths of wood, with cross-sleepers spaced to prevent the rails spreading apart; this is contrary to the method we've got used to. By the mid-1850s though, there began a move to the system we have now, with rails laid on cross-sleepers. The 'ride' on these early railways could be poor - though probably a lot better than the equivalent via the stage coach.

For much of the 19th century & into the early 20th century in some places, ballast (usually of crushed stone) covered the sleepers, unlike later practice where the sleepers were clear of such. I haven't yet found out why - did they think that the extra cover would protect the wooden sleepers in some way?

Bridges at the outset were made of wood (or a few of stone), largely as a cost-saving measure; only much later in the life of the railway would steel bridges replace these structures (and a few of these latter can still be seen along the track of the old railway). Wood was readily available locally of course - a useful source of revenue to the large estates through which the railway passed, whose owners were often large shareholders of the railway.

Maintenance in the early years was contracted out but around 1856, the L & SWR decided to bring all permanent way & track maintenance 'in house' and from this date, the category of 'plate-layers' appears in the lists of railway employees. West Moors had a team of such men from the earliest days of operations.
 ... WEST MOORS CROSSING LODGE:

At West Moors, at the 'Station Road' crossing (no station of course at this date & the 'road' just a rutted cart track effectively), there was a gate house (No.19): this housed the resident gate-keeper who would control road traffic (mainly carts & driven animals) to the schedule set down for the running of the railway. Traffic wanting to cross the railway would be light, and the trains crossed at relatively low speed, so it would have been fairly easy to maintain safety, provided the gate-man was conscientious & had an accurate clock. Signals, when they did appear, were basic and based on a rotating disk system. Later, the more familiar semaphore signals were introduced, but of the lower-quadrant type (see above). However, it is thought that fixed signals (as opposed to hand-held flags / lamps) were not provided at West Moors until the establishment of the Junction in 1866, though there is a mention of ladders being provided to service the "high signals" at the gates on the "Dorchester line" in 1859, which might imply that fixed signals were in fact available at West Moors by this date. If there was a halt here (yet to be proved), then it would seem logical that some way of signalling to the driver of a train would be provided.

West Moors crossing lodge was built for the opening of the railway in 1847, and was unusual in that it (together with the next one down the line at Dolman's Crossing, Ameysford) was double-storey. Families of the time were used to living in what we would regard as very small houses / cottages, so this 'over-engineering' must be for a reason. It is tempting to suggest that at least in the case of West Moors, the crossing lodge was always intended to 'service' a function other than opening and closing of gates.

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The crossing lodge was the first building by the railway in the village - indeed, I would argue that there wasn't a 'village' as such at this time (1846/47) and incidentally, it is the last ex-railway building standing, now surrounded by later developments. There was no station here of course, but double crossing gates were thought to be needed, which, interestingly, would have been kept closed against road traffic except when a cart or carriage needed to cross - which event would have been highly infrequent in the middle part of the nineteenth century hereabouts. Pedestrians would not really need the gate to be open fully of course. This might seem odd to us, used to a continual stream of cars and people up and down Station Road (as it became by the 1870s), but in the middle of the 19th century, as in centuries before, country-folk would be quite used to using farm tracks, crossing (or skirting) fields and of course movement from one property to another was not frequent anyway. For most, apart from the Sunday trek to West Parley church, there was very little requirement to cross the railway.
 ... IMPACT ON THE COMMUNITY:

West Moors was not a 'stop' on the railway for the first 19 years of its life, at least not officially, but the effect was felt even here. Goods traffic quickly became very important on these early railways (and would remain so until well into the twentieth century); for example, coal movement, both for households, industry and the railways themselves doubled between 1855 and 1875. The railway brought goods in via Wimborne or Ringwood, such as coal, that quickly replaced the use of products of the heathland (gorse, peat & turf - changing the 'look' of the heath) to heat homes and to cook with: the coal 'stage' in the station yard became one of the iconic images of Britain's railways.

'Exotic' goods are now available to those that can afford to buy them - perhaps ordered for delivery by the growing network of post offices. The railway encouraged this 'small-packet' traffic with a daily (but not Sunday) 'pick-up' goods train, though the practice of hooking goods wagons to timetabled passenger trains also prevailed - this latter would be usual for many years and often led to unbalanced train-sets and problems with time-keeping. There would have been a outflow of produce too - the local farms exporting surpluses to nearby growing towns, particularly Bournemouth. And of course, hand-in-hand with the development of the railways across Britain, the growth of the postal service was accelerated; the 'mails' were first carried on this line from October of 1847, with nightly 'mail drops' to the principal towns along the way.

Another local impact was of course the arrival of the family at the crossing gate-house and there is mention, by the date of the 1851 census, of a plate-layer. Plate-layers were very important to the functioning of the railway, as they had the responsibility for ensuring that the 'permanent way' was safe and secure. The ballast had to be kept packed under the sleepers, the rail joints checked as were the rails themselves. Gangs of plate-layers would be responsible for a 'length' of track in either direction from where they were based (and often lived).
 With hindsight, it is difficult to understand why a station was built at West Moors! Just because there was a junction didn't mean that a station was required - the railway network was littered with such - but there is the story of a 'halt' here for whatever purpose & also there may have been a siding from quite an early date - perhaps under the control of the crossing keeper. The 1851 census does not suggest any settlement that would warrant even a halt, let alone a station; neither was there any industry or significant agriculture to justify a goods yard. We know that the L & SWR were reluctant to build a station building at West Moors. In fact the facilities were not opened until August 1867, eight months after the junction was brought into use. There was no need for an exchange of passengers either, as the Salisbury & Dorset Junction trains ran through to Wimborne.
 In 1859, the milder climate of Dorset attracted the attention of the Stewart family: these were successful nurserymen who had, since the 18th century, developed a flourishing business in Dundee, eastern Scotland. Residential development and the presence of wealthy & large landed estates across southern England provided a ready market for the products of such nurseries and the Stewarts were quick to fill the need.
 Two of the Stewart brothers, William and David bought a large plot of land (circa 74 acres) north of the Wimborne - Ringwood turnpike and east of what is now West Moors Road, and quickly established themselves: William remained in Scotland managing that part of the enterprise, and it was the younger brother, David, who was to develop the site to its full potential. Given the already high reputation of Stewarts, it was natural that orders for plants would come from further afield than the immediate area of Dorset and SW Hampshire and the adjacent access to the growing railway network provided the means to fulfil these orders. I suspect, though can't as yet provide documentary evidence, that the goods traffic generated tipped the balance towards the provision of a fully-functioning station.

Note that not only was the site handy for links to local customers (especially the rapidly growing Bournemouth to the south), but with West Moors essentially an agricultural settlement, a source of semi-skilled and skilled labour was readily available. Also by this time, children of families attracted by the arrival of the railway were also available for employment in the Nursery. The land straddles two basic soil types: the poorer, heathland soils in the southwest sector, and the rather richer, though boggier, land in the northeast. Indeed Stewarts were eventually to utilise the availability of the latter features and became renowned growers and sellers of aquatic plants across England - water lilies being a speciality by the early decade of the 20th century. 		Stewarts Nursery 19thCentury
 By 1915, Stewarts were one of the largest plant suppliers in Britain (and a large employer locally); the goods revenue for the railway must have been very welcome. The firm provided the 'northern' focus for the growing town of 'Fern Down' (later Ferndown) and until the 1920s, the centre-of-gravity for this settlement was along the Wimborne Road and immediately north and south of it - explaining why there is a centre separate from the modern town in this area: the telephone exchange, post office, chapel etc., were all located in this area - some way north of the modern town centre, which latter has Victoria Road & the Poole-Ringwood road as its focus.

Stewarts were using the railway until long into the twentieth century but the greater flexibility of road transport, and the improvement of the road network eventually removed the need for local access to the railway and for this and other commercial reasons, Stewarts relocated away from Ferndown in the latter part of the 1950s.
 ... DEVELOPMENTS UP TO 1866 (JUNCTION OPENS):

In 1848, just one year after the line was opened for business, the London & South-Western Railway, which had from the start provided the motive power, carriages & wagons etc., bought-up the Southampton & Dorchester railway in its entirety. This was quite a common story across the country.

As traffic increased, and this line in particular became very busy, the original Act of Parliament required that a doubling-up should take place: although allowed for in the engineering of the track-bed & bridges etc., the railway resisted this on cost grounds, but was forced to follow the terms of the Act by the Board of Trade. So, just 10 years after opening, in 1857, the line between Ringwood & Wimborne (including the stretch through West Moors) was doubled. A year later, the line towards Southampton was doubled, and the remainder of the line to Dorchester was thus-treated by summer 1863. I've not found any description of how the additional line impacted upon the crossing here in West Moors - presumably the original line was laid near to the lodge, with the additional track-bed / metals to the south of that. It wouldn't be logical to lay the original single line mid-track and then have to move it aside to make way for the second track.
With doubling-up, the duties of the gate-keeper would have increased and by this time it may be that repeating telegraphs (from Wimborne and Ringwood) would be available to help the gate-man to monitor traffic.

The spur to upgrading the line was the opening of the Great Western Railway [GWR] line to Weymouth (in 1857), over which [ using dual-gauge metals ] the L & SWR had running powers. The route Weymouth - Dorchester - Southampton - Waterloo was just over 20 miles shorter than the corresponding GWR service (via Yeovil - single line originally, but doubled-up early 1880s, then singled again late 1960s), and ex-Channel Islands traffic in particular was considerable - hence the need for additional running space.
 ... SALISBURY & DORSET JUNCTION RAILWAY - PLANS:

By the opening decade of the 1860s, despite the shocks and stresses involved in the 'Railway Mania', whereby totally unrealistic schemes were put forward for consideration, there were in the local area great demands for better railway services than those already provided, particularly with respect to the rapidly growing town of Bournemouth. As of 1861, if you wanted to travel to Bournemouth, then you either headed for what we now call 'Hamworthy Goods' (though at the time this was THE Poole station) on the Hamworthy peninsula, headed across the toll bridge to Poole town then over the heathland eastwards to Bournemouth. Or, if you were wealthy, you could take advantage of the practice of 'slipping' a flat-bed truck carrying your carriage at West Moors, and then proceeding across country south to the growing town - apparently this was very popular as it avoided the rather round-about route via Poole.

However, during 1860, work had started on a branch line, which left the main line well to the west of Ringwood then headed for Christchurch, passing down the Avon valley. This was seen as a major step on the way to bringing the advantages of the railway to the area, not only to Christchurch (a long-established and prosperous community, then in Hampshire, now in SE Dorset), but also as part of a plan to drive access to Bournemouth from the east. The line was opened for traffic on the 13th November 1862 as far as Christchurch, but not extended to Bournemouth (East) until 14th March, 1870. It was natural then that, to try and connect areas to the north (i.e. via Salisbury) and possibly encourage the Great Western Railway to take an interest, that a railway was proposed from near Salisbury (Alderbury Junction as it became), running via Fordingbridge to West Moors (then only a tiny hamlet of cottages), whence two branches would diverge: one striking towards Poole and the other south-eastwards to join the line to Christchurch. The map on the right shows (schematically) the (then) existing main line, the 'under-construction' Ringwood, Christchurch & Bournemouth Railway (RCBR), and the proposed Salisbury, Poole & Dorset Junction Railway (SP&DJR).

 Map local railways 1860s1870s
 Notes relating to diagram: (1) later named 'Hamworthy Goods'; (2) later named 'Hamworthy Junction'; (3) not originally a station on the 1847 line - opened to service the Poole branch in 1872 as 'New Poole Junction', eventually named 'Broadstone Junction' by 1888; (4) West Moors was not opened until 1866 (as a junction) and the station building not until 1867; (5) Hurn was originally called 'Hearne Bridge'; (6) Bournemouth (East) was located to the east of the present-day Bournemouth station; (7) Bournemouth (West) was only opened in 1874; (8) Poole was opened in 1872 at the end of a single-line branch from Broadstone, which was subsequently extended to Bournemouth (West) in 1874.
 In the event, serious financial difficulties meant that the section from Alderbury Junction to West Moors only was completed: not really a surprise as the 'plan' to encourage the Great Western concern to run traffic down this line was doomed from the start. The GWR didhave a line reaching Salisbury at this time, but it would have needed running-powers over the L&SWR metals south of Salisbury, which in large part were planned as single-track; the control and integrating of trains would have been difficult to say the least - also the L&SWR were keen to route traffic over their metals entirely, avoiding the Salisbury & Dorset Junction Railway.
 When completed (in 1866, December), although the line did not bring any benefits for those wanting to reach Bournemouth, it did bring an alternative method of reaching the increasingly popular destination of Weymouth (for the Channel Island boat traffic). You could now either travel down the existing main line from Waterloo to Southampton, then west via Ringwood, or travel down to Salisbury, changing to a train travelling due south, which then joined the main line at West Moors for the remainder of the journey west. Apparently, this second option was very popular; there were in the early days four trains daily (Sundays excluded) between Salisbury and Wimborne.
 Incidentally, on the line opening, there was still no station at West Moors despite this new service! The London & South Western belatedly built a single-storey 'house-like' edifice which opened as late at August 1867, eight months after the start of 'junction' services. Given that there was still very little habitation in the area, this was a great act of faith! A story I have seen (reported in "Dorset Railways" / Colin Maggs) is that the L & SWR were prevailed upon to build the station to 'boost' flagging traffic receipts on the Salisbury & Dorset Junction Railway. Not sure if I see the logic of this: as noted above, the population of the immediate area was no more than 160 souls, and perhaps around 300 if you include the wider 'catchment' area of a station hereabouts. The only logical reason would be to facilitate inter-change eastwards to Ringwood and beyond, and the S &DJcRly services already ran westward to Wimborne - where there were very good exchange facilities for both passenger and goods traffic. The only other reason would be to replace (if it existed - it hasn't been established to my satisfaction) the 'ad-hoc' Halt that apparently was a feature at this point.

Whatever the reason, the Salisbury & Dorset Junction Railway had to pay an annual 'upkeep fee' (£20=) to the London & South Western for use of the station, which implies to my mind it was for the primary benefit of the former concern.
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