Southeast England

During the Napoleonic Wars when foreign travel either to continental spas or on the Grand Tour became impossible, the gentry had to make do with visiting such South Coast fishing villages as Brighthelmstone. By start of the Regency period this village had been transformed into the fashionable resort of Brighton, later resulting in up to 22 stage coaches a day bringing wealthy visitors to the town from London alone. Little wonder that in 1823 William James proposed to connect London with Brighton “by a line of Engine Railroad”. However, after a great deal of expensive survey work by eminent engineers and controversy over the best route, an Act for the construction of a line was finally passed in July 1837.

Parliament insisted that the line start from a junction with the London & Croydon Railway (opened in 1839) near Norwood. The London & Brighton Railway (sic) generally followed the direct route via Redhill and Haywards Heath previously proposed by John Rennie; its engineer was John Rastrick, with David Mocatta employed as architect. Opened in stages, the line reached Brighton on 21 September 1841. On 27 July 1846, the L&B amalgamated with the L&C, the Brighton and Chichester Railway (completed in 1846) and the Brighton, Lewes and Hastings Railway (opened to Lewes in 1846) to form the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway.

Our journey begins at the former Coulsdon North station, opened by the LB&SCR in september 1899 and closed in 1983 as part of BR’s Brighton Line resignalling project. Following the success of electrification on the South London lines, the LB&SCR Board decided in 1912 to electrify the whole of their suburban network using the same overhead 6,600V ac system operating at 25Hz. Coulsdon would be one of the termini. The project, which depended on German technology and equipment, was delayed by World War I and completed by the Southern Railway in 1925. By then the SR had already decided to abandon the overhead ac system in favour of the London & South Western Railway‘s 600V third rail dc system. The last ac powered train ran to Cousldon in September 1929.

Continuing on the original route, in 1983 the semaphore signalling at Redhill remained and the original Southern Railway colour light signals controlled from the SR debased Art Deco style Type 13 signal box at Three Bridges still existed. 1982 saw a new station concourse at Gatwick Airport and work proceeding on the new Area Signalling Centre at Three Bridges (commissioned 1983) to control the main line from East Croydon to the coast. Thirty years later, control of a much larger area, extending as far north as St. Pancras, is gradually being transferred to the replacement Railway Operating Centre.

Reaching Brighton, photos show the magnificent iron trainsheds of 1882-3 designed by H.E. Wallis and the brick arches supporting David Mocatta’s 1841 station, extended in 1852-54. The gallery ends with Brighton’s other pioneering electric railway designed by Magnus Volk and opened in August 1883; almost exactly 50 years before the UK’s first mainline electric train service began on 1 January 1933.

EPB at Coulsdon North station (1983)

Coulsdon North station (1983)

EPB units in Coulsdon North station (1983)

EPB in Coulsdon North station (1983)

Coulsdon North Station Sidings Signal Box

Coulsdon North signal box & sidings (1983)

Redhill ‘A’ signal box (1983)

VEP & EPB at Redhill (1983)

Class 119 at Redhill (1983)

Signals at Redhill station

Signals at Redhill (1983)

Gatwick Airport station (1982)

Three Bridges signal box (1983)

Old & new signals at Three Bridges (1983)

Three Bridges ASC (2016)

Three Bridges ROC (2016)

VEP+CIG near Hassocks (1979)

VEP emerging from Clayton tunnel (1979)

House above Clayton tunnel (1979)

Co-acting signals at Brighton (2019)

EPB in Brighton station

Brighton station roof (2010)

Brighton station roof detail (2010)

Underneath Brighton station (2010)

Underneath Brighton station (2010)

Volks Railway at Black Rock (1978)

Also featured are links between Gatwick and Heathrow airports. The “Airlink” helicopter service began in June 1978 as a B-Cal/BA/BAA joint venture, although BA later withdrew. In 1984 the CAA renewed its licence for 10 years, but the Secretary of State for Transport (Nicholas Ridley) overturned this decision and insisted the service cease 4 months after completion of the M25 route between the airports. The service ended in February 1986. After that date, the only direct link between the airports has been the coach connection first established by the NBC subsidiary “Green Line“.

Railways in Kent and the far east of Sussex were the province of the South Eastern & Chatham Railway. Formed in 1899 by a legal working union between two existing companies, the South Eastern Railway (opened 1842-44) and the London, Chatham & Dover Railway (created in 1859), whose intense rivalry had been damaging to profits and investment, the two companies remaining as distinct legal entities. More history can be found on the SE&CR Society’s website.

Hampshire, Dorset and westwards was the province of the London & South Western Railway. The company began as the London & Southampton Railway, reaching Soton in 1840. It also wished to reach Portsmouth, but following opposition from both town and Navy, had to be content with Parliamentary approval for a branch from Eastleigh (then known as Bishopstoke) to Gosport (opened in November 1841), changing the company name at the same time. Portsmouth was finally reached by the L&SWR in 1848 through a joint arrangement with the LB&SCR which had already arrived. Despite such setbacks, the L&SWR continued to expand, both through asquisition and their own construction, until the network extended as far as Padstow in Cornwall. Exhaustive details are on Wikipedia.

The photos are arranged in a more-or-less clockwise fashion round the South coast.

The journey begins with the SE&CR on the Isle of Sheppey at Sheerness-on-Sea and continues via Margate to Hastings beach and St. Leonards Warrior Square. The station names link to pages on the Kentrail website giving far more information about their, sometimes complex, histories than I could possibly provide here. Also included is the Redhill to Tonbridge line, part of the original SER main line to Dover prior to their building the cutoff via Sevenoaks.

The L&SWR transferred their carriage & wagon works from Nine Elms to Eastleigh in 1891, followed by the locomotive works in 1909. Eastleigh became the principal works of the Southern Railway after the 1923 Grouping, specialising in electric multiple units such as the BUF unit shown. For obvious reasons the COR/RES/BUF units, which only had one driver’s cab window, were referred to as “Nelson Units” by the Portsmouth crews. More about these units is on the Southern Electric Group website. At Portsmouth a link was provided in 1846 between the joint LB&SCR/L&SWR station and the internal railway system (begun in 1843) of Her Majesty’s Naval Base. Remains of this “Admiralty Line” were still visible in 1985 and can be seen on the 1910 Railway Clearing House map.

Sir William Tite’s 1839 terminus at Southampton for the L&SR survives, as does the 1867 South Western Hotel designed by John Norton (1832-1904) originally built for a private developer. More details and photos of the hotel can be found here. The gallery ends with a Class 50 thundering down the L&SWR main line with a train for Exeter.