125 – Chasewater Railway Museum Bits & Pieces – From Chasewater News April 1990

125 – Chasewater Railway Museum Bits & Pieces

From Chasewater News April 1990

Midland Railway – Brownhills Branch – B. Bull

Copy of what may have been a locally commercially available postcard depicting a MR Johnson design 3F 0-6-0 of the type introduced in 1885 and rebuilt by Fowler from 1916 with Belpaire boiler.

Looking back through various back numbers of ‘Mercian’, ‘Chasewater News’ and ‘Railway Focus’ it becomes apparent that little has been published to inform members of the history of this branch, part of which trackbed provides us with the base for our own Chasewater Light Railway operations.  An even more glaring omission is that we have not made available for publication the few interesting photographs in the museum collection.

 On July 1^st, 1879 the Midland Railway had opened a line from Castle Bromwich to Walsall with intermediate stations at Penns, Sutton Coldfield, Sutton Park, Streetly and Aldridge.  Whilst this line was being constructed, a branch from Aldridge to Walsall Wood was authorised on July 13^th, 1876, with further extension to the western shores of Norton Pool being authorised on August 6^th, 1880 to give an end-on connection with the Cannock Chase & Wolverhampton Railway, just south of the causeway.

The contractors for this 3¾ mile branch were H.Lovatt & Co.Ltd.  I am unable, however, to discover any details of the contractor’s locomotives which would undoubtedly been used on this project.

On April 1^st, 1882 the branch opened as far as Brownhills West for goods only, with the connection to the CC & WR being opened on November 1^st, 1882.

Just north of the A5 road there was a short lived spur to the Coppice Colliery, Wilkin, owned by J.Owen Ltd.  (Later the Coppice Colliery Company.  This spur closed when the colliery was shut in 1894.

Passenger services commenced to the newly opened stations at Walsall Wood and Brownhills Midland on July 1^st, 1884, but colliery traffic continued to be the mainstay of the branch.

Brownhills Midland was over half a mile out of town just north of the A452 Chester Road, whereas the LNWR station on the South Staffs Walsall line was handily situated at the end of High Street so it was no surprise when the LMS withdrew the passenger service on March 31^st, 1930, Brownhills Midland being demolished soon afterwards.One amazing survivor is a wooden ‘finger’ which used to point the way to the platforms.  This piece owes its continued existence to the gentleman who fortuitously purchased from the site a pile of wood to build himself a garden shed, the finger surviving long enough to find its way by means of a donation to the RPS collection.  However, I digress slightly, goods traffic continued on the branch until the closure of former Cannock Chase Colliery pits by the National Coal Board in the late 1950s, the line being lifted between Aldridge and Brownhills West in 1960, with the CC & WR remnants left around the northern shores, mainly going by 1963.  Last day of passenger services at Brownhills Midland.  A Johnson 3F, No.3277, with two coaches of compartment stock including a clerestory probably dating from the period 1897 to 1916.  The porter seems to be holding up a closure notice or something similar perhaps.

What was left owed its continued existence to the NCB Area Workshops which was then just rail connected to the former LNWR Norton Branch via a circuitous route through the closed Conduit Colliery yard reached by a spur just south of the causeway.  A small amount of the original Midland Railway metals had been left as a headshunt, this being part of the former exchange sidings with the CC & WR and it was some nine years after the Railway Preservation Society came to Chasewater before British Railways ‘rediscovered’ the sidings left for NCB use in 1960 when the rest of the branch had been lifted.  By then of course the Society had extended their track into the park so the still BR owned piece fell in the middle of the Chasewater Light Railway.  How this problem was surmounted will be the subject of a future article, as it is a story in itself.Standard MR platform lamps on hexagonal posts are in evidence, but the sawn paled fence seen in the postcard view has been replaced with the sawn diagonal variety by the time these photos were taken.

The photographs

These form part of the Museum’s collection of local photographs, some of which will be made available to the Editor to feature in future issues of Chasewater News.  With 1990 being some 60 years since Brownhills Midland closed its doors to passengers, it is especially pleasing to be able to provide photos of the last day of services, March 31^st, 1930.