HAWKHURST BRANCH Kent steam train cab ride 1958
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 9 พ.ค. 2016
- After seeing a selection of other steam trains at Paddock Wood, we turn to the Hawkhurst Branch. The branch engine (ex-SECR H class of 1904) takes water, then we set off for the ride to Hawkhurst, some of it on the footplate. The return is filmed from the leading end of the train, now in "push" mode.
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Related links:
Hawkhurst Branch Line en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawkhur...
South Eastern Railway en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_E...)
Southern Region en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Souther...
South East Main Line en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_E...
South Eastern & Chatham Railway SE&CR en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_E...
Medway Valley Line en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medway_...
Southeastern en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southea...)
Paddock Wood en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paddock... www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/srb/R15... www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/srb/T10...
249 Squadron Loco en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BR_Batt...
SE&CR Locos en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locomot...
H Class Loco en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SECR_H_...
Hops Oast House en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oast_house
Churn Lane Siding en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Churn_S...
Horsmonden en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsmon... www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/srb/R17...
Goudhurst en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goudhurst www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/srb/R17...
Guard Van / Brake Van en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British...
Braking en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway...
Pattenden Siding en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pattend...
Hartley en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hartley...
Cranbrook en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cranbro... www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/srb/R17...
Token System en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Token_(...)
Signalman Bell Codes en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway...
Cranbrook & Tenterden Light Railway Proposed en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cranbro...
Badgers Oak Tunnel commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Rother Valley Railway en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_an...
Hawkhurst en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawkhurst www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/srb/R17...
High Weald en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_We...
Rye Proposed Link en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rye_rai...)
River Teise en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_T...
British Railways BR en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British...
Beeching Report en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beechin...
Steam hauled68's 2009 Hawkhurst Branch • The Hawkhurst Branch L...
Derek Hayward's Photos www.derekhayward.co.uk/Hawkhu...
Friends Blogs friendsofthehawkurstline.blogs...
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What you have filmed is not only fantastic! Shows a whole way of life now long gone.
Worked this branch as a fireman on loan from Hither green loco. Also Headcorn and Westerham Branches finishing my days as a driver at Brick layers arms this i did enjoy.
Superb video. In all honesty we desperately need this railway from Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst reopened. Another 400 houses to be built in Hawkhurst and the roads are already saturated. Many thanks for this video.
My late father easily spotted on the last days of both the Hawkhurst and Goudhurst lines worked often at Paddock Wood from his signal relief base at Cuxton and he used to keep in his head the old Hawkhurst timings even though the line had long gone. He did that for most of his life thereafter and could at a drop of a hat chuck out the train code, times etc for most the boxes he worked whether North Kent East Junc, Sittingbourne, Sheppey line, the only two boxes he never worked at was Meopham power and Dartford power and I remember all the little boxes displaced by those two boxes as I remember Orpington A as a kiddie and I even got to see inside the Orpington nuclear bunker.
Thank you for sharing these lovely Films, makes you realise how much we've lost, all the Work of those who cut the Railways, those who maintained them and worked them over the Years, all thrown on the scrap Heap, what a terrible waste.
Thanks for Sharing, my great uncle, was a fireman and driver out of tonbridge from the age of 14 until retirement. I saw his engine but not him.
How come 8 people don't like this wonderful film ? Ignoramus maximus x 8.
Do you remember the old saying "You can't please all of the people all of the time" ? Could be they hit the wrong symbol by mistake.
I travelled on the line throughout the 1950's to go hop picking at Finchcox Farm. We'd started at Burgess Hill on the Btighton line, change at Three Bridges, East Grinstead, Tunbridge Wells, Tonbridge and Paddock Wood. It used to take all day to make a journey you could drive in 50 minutes. It would be impossible today post-Beeching. Meals cooked over a fire in the cookhouse, sleeping on straw in a hut with a corrugated roof, deafening when it rained. You'd pick from 8.00 am and the farmer would bring a horse-drawn wagon to weigh and take yout hops to the oast for drying, the most evocative smell there is.
Thanks for uploading this. I used to live in Paddock Wood when I was a kid in the 1980's.
Back then the branch line was long gone but we'd play out in the old hop fields & one day we went out a little further & found the old branch line track bed. We followed it under a nearby bridge & as far as the old level crossing at Willow Lane between Paddock Wood & Horsmonden. Ever since then I've wondered sometimes about how the line looked when it was operating so this was fascinating to me
That would make a great heritage line.Pity it never got to Tenterden.
Yes, would have been costly to keep it going but surely lots of potential pleasure passengers.
Please REVIVE this line!
Many thanks for a superb video post....as one of an old hop picking family this film resonates...
1958 is like another world, today
@Simon Taylor. Yes Simon: "The past is another country, they do things differently there": L.P Hartley.
we had so much yet we thew it all away. we don't know it's gone till its gone,
Brilliant nostalgia, thanks!
Wonderful Video, thanks for bringing it to us.
Brilliantly researched and presented - thanks! As a train-obsessed child growing up in Horsmonden in the early 1980's, what I would have given for this lovely little line to have still existed.
I travelled daily by bus between Hawkhurst and Cranbrook for school in 1969-71. Although the line was long closed, the signal box at Hawkhurst and the tall station building at Cranbrook were still extant
An absolute gem of a film; I hope a copy is kept in the Kent County Archive. Thank you so very much for putting this film into the public domain. A1.
Thanks, interesting rail on your channel for my viewers too th-cam.com/users/RUOKH good to cross-promote
This is brilliant stuff, so atmospheric. Thank you for sharing.
Thanks James, my viewers will enjoy your model rail channel th-cam.com/channels/oE2JpSK-jXq8ydE_rPHAzg.htmlvideos ... good to cross-promote!
Interesting to see that at 6.53 the signal at Hawkhurst seems to be in the car park! As always, a fascinating film.
Makes me appreciate the Osmo Action and Rock Steady! No IBIS in those days I'm afraid!
There should have been film footage taken of ALL branch lines that were closed.
That would have been prohibitively expensive considering the costs of film cameras and stock.
Not sure if anyone gives a damn but if you're bored like me atm then you can stream all the latest series on instaflixxer. Been binge watching with my gf during the lockdown xD
@Keaton Joey Yup, been watching on instaflixxer for months myself :)
@Keaton Joey yea, have been using InstaFlixxer for since december myself :D
@@davidyoung yes indeed.
We all should be grateful for the movies that were made and the dedication of their producers who did so much at their own expense.
HI im proud to say my DEAR old Dad was part of all this im 67 now' WE COME from the City as was generations of all the family'' Central LONDON SW.. DAD was a Driver for 36 years on lots of Class of Trains ,,HIS main Station was VICTORIA we lived in BATTERSEA stewarts rd near the old DECCA record company sidings Stewarts Lane &NINE ELMS not far from Battersea park.. 'growing up i STILL CAN see my Dad Going out spotless IN HIS overalls and cap , AND coming home with the SMELL of the graft on all those Journeys he done that day .. Those Spotless overalls FILTHY , poor old mum had to do her bit for B,R as well With the Washing,, HE DONE Regular Journeys to ROYAL TUNBRIDGE WELLS..route ,not to mention the BLITZ IN 1940S London he WAS A FIREMAN on troop carrier trains also , BUT i must admit he;d take me over the railway shed SIDINGS in Stewarts lane ALL THOSE Trains USED TO REALLY SCARE ME LIKE STEAMING DRAGONS I DIDN'T LIKE Going on the footplate of Trains ... LOVE TO DAD AND MUM
At 4.09 the train passes under "Finchcocks Bridge " , which luckily has survived and is is now a listed building . The bridge was only wide enough for a single track . Therefore , a siding , which ran parallel to the main track ended just short of the bridge . On the return journey , at 8.47 , one can briefly see the siding at the left . I used to live and work at Finchcocks from 1973 onwards , by which time , everything had been lifted several years ago , but the course of the track could still be clearly seen as a distinct line in the countryside .
Superb movie.
Like your other films, not just excellent footage, but informative commentary also.
I particularly enjoyed the explanation of how the driver in the driving trailer controlled the braking while the fireman on the footplate opened and closed the regulator on the driver's instructions by bell signal.
In the late fifties and early sixties, indeed the seventies also, cine film was very expensive, even for a mere five minutes. Therefore I appreciate the commitment of making the film initially and more recently, digitising it.
Well done and thank you both.
Interesting that even when an operational line, the track in many places is almost completely enshrouded in trees and bushes!
Is there any more good quality film such as this of the Hawkhurst to Paddock Wood line? The Hawkhurst to Paddock Wood line was the line that should have been saved for preservation in preference to the KESR. Look how many commuters travel from Hawkhurst, Cranbrook, Goudhurst and Horsmonden to London these days and have to drive over to Staplehurst etc. to catch a train. 1950s Hawkhurst had the railway and the Maidstone and District Bus Station yet today Hawkhurst has nothing worth mentioning being isolated with an abysmal lack of decent transport connections.
great stuff
Whispering poplars
This poem was sparked by a walk in 2018 near the site of Churn Siding on the Hawkhurst Branch railway which closed in 1961. In the summer of 1962 as the line was being lifted I walked along the rusting tracks and at one point was struck by the sound of the breeze rippling through some mature poplar trees. From the 1960s traditional hop growing in Kent also went into steep decline.A poplar tree is not long lived but these trees outlived that railway which was only there for about 70 years
Whispering poplars
Whispering poplars
Saplings so small
Your girth will expand
Your height become tall.
Bark will whiten and trunk will harden,
Shelter provide for new hop garden.
Whispering poplars swarthy navvies view,
Who curse and dig and boil up stew
On open fires in makeshift camps
Walk nightly to inns
by flickering lamps.
Whispering poplars now in their prime
Trains chug gently along the line
Autumn brings hoppers from the smoke
To live in huts
and pick for the poke.
Whispering poplars now past their best,
Leaves never still,
Never at rest
The railway’s gone the hoppers too
Landscape is hushed
Just the breeze and you.
And pictorial records, of which my film [with added naration, spoken by my missus] is one.
@AlanSnowdon Would it be possible to incorporate your remarkable footage into a film I'm making about this branch?
The footbridge at Paddock Wood station is sadly no more, due to corporate vandalism of what should have been a listed structure. It was erected circa 1840 when the station was built. It has been replaced with a gaudy looking twin towered structure of an inapropriate looking design that is not in keeping with the look of the Victorian Station itself.
thra5herxb12s 0
I agree in part. The bridge could have been saved & rebuilt at a historic railway but as an occasional user of Paddock Wood station & former resident of the town I have to say the new bridge is a vast improvement over the original, particularly as it has disabled access lifts. Personally I think the brickwork of the new structure compliments the remaining original station building.
It's just one of many changes to the station over the years. For example you can see the original, much larger station buildings on the north side of the line at the end of the film, now long gone. I presume they were torn down some time between this & when first moved there (1980) as the town grew up on the south side of the line, rendering buildings on the north side useless. Since I've known the station that's been a car park.
I used to travel to school and back home on that line from 1953 until 1958 and had to hurry over the footbridge to get seats in a carriage for our group. There were never enough seats for us all. I recall that in winter and on rainy days the wooden planks of the bridge were very slippery. Oh far off days.
Think I've got the song formatted properly now! I'll try and find a video of a performance of it to link as well. Bob takes a lot of care that his "historic" songs of Kent and Sussex are authentic. I think he interviewed a couple of the drivers from this line to get inspiration for this one.Do you know Bob Kenward's song "Old Country Train"? It's about this line:
Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden
Pulling through the hopyards,pushing back again
Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane
We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train
Driver up the car end, sitting at his ease
Fireman on the engine, doing as he please
By Wealden woods and orchards, all the seasons through
We worked the line by pull-and-push on duty 312.
We’d a Chatham tank from Tonbridge, 17-0-4
And a two-set off the Brighton line,seen better years before
Never had a guard, just a crate or two of fruit
And a couple-or-three passengers all in their market suits:
Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden
Pulling through the hopyards,pushing back again
Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane
We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train
September brought the hoppers, we watched them all go past
Coppertops and Converts, working fit to bust
Hammering through Goudhurst,charging Badger’s Oak
With the roughest of the old stock they could find up in the Smoke:
Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden
Pulling through the hopyards,pushing back again
Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane
We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train
I’ve taken out a Crompton from the yard at Hither Green
Come home off the Dover run,my working clothes all clean
But give me back the rails and that old Chatham tank
I’d be back on steam tomorrow, charging Cranbrook bank:
Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden
Pulling through the hopyards, pushing back again
Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane
We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train
I sing it at open mics and folk clubs sometimes and it always goes down well, especially locally in Kent.
I'm sure I've heard this on the folk programme on Radio Kent with Doug Welch as I recognise some of the lyrics. In fact I think they played another song about the line the other week, do you know if there is more than one song about the branch?
I've not heard any other songs about this line....this is the only one I know of. It's quite probable that Doug Welch has played the song, as it's recorded on Bob's first album and I've heard him play a couple of other songs from it at various times. The CD version finishes with a few steam whistles and engine sounds.
I've just checked and Doug played this song on last week's show, it starts at 12 minutes 44 seconds www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04tj08l I'm sure there is another song though so I'll email Doug and ask if he can remember.
Ah, That's the Pete Metcalfe/ Paul Stepto version. Pete was my guitar teacher (and still gives me occasional lessons). The Bob Kenward (original) version sounds very different and if you've heard both of them you might very well think there are two songs, the difference is so big. Not saying that there aren't 2 songs about the line, just that I only know of one. There are 2 other versions recorded that I know of, plus my own (as yet unrecorded) effort.
Doug has just played Bob Kenward's very good original version on tonight's folk programme and I think it may well be this version that I heard and thought was a different song about the line. It's quite different to the Metcalfe/Stepto version as you say and having heard both versions I think I prefer Bob's.
What a gem of footage I've never seen before. The tall building opposite Paddock Wood station is the old Scats building. I never knew what they did there but I walked around it shortly before it was demolished.
I remember that building & it's demolition from when I grew up in Paddock Wood.
I don't know for sure but I think it was used as a centralised hop drying building as none of the oasts in the area where in use by then.
I remember thinking the building looked like a ship when I was a kid because it had funnels either side of the central portion. This, added to the fact that during the late summer & early autumn the whole town would stink of hops makes me think that's what it was used for.
It was demolished around the same time that Whitbread's sold the hop farm site & large scale hop production in the area was scaled back. The smell of hops was absent after it was demolished.
I lived at Paddock Wood from 1946, and moved in into a house opposite the station in 1954. I remember the hop warehouse being built. At that time it was the biggest hop warehouse in the world. From that time I would have haunted Paddock Wood Railway station until I Started work in 1962. After that I caught the train every day to and from work
It was the hops marketing board building.
Reopen the lines i say! Kent was ruined by modernisation....The world's on a one way ticket to oblivion anyway!
Presumably, two of the idiots who ruined it voted this video down.
Bonnie i agree with you opening the closed lines down with luck the Kent and east sussex railway will be getting in to robertsbridge soon
Grent
Hello Alan - I hope you have already but you do realise that these films should be lodged with the National Railway Museum? They're a wonderful record, not only of the trains and railways but the local scenery of that time - and they're in colour. They should be stored and preserved, no question about it. If you haven't already, I do hope you consider it. Thanks.
I'm delighted with your reaction to this film I shot as a young man, BUT several years ago, long before the internet existed, I DID contact the NRM - they just weren't interested. However, now that TH-cam exists, it allows a much greater, even WORLDWIDE audience. I've had some response from t'other side of the world !
@@AlanSnowdonArchive Crazy, Alan, the films are irreplaceable. Did they give a reason?
As I recall, they were only interested in PROFESSIONALLY made items. They probably don't have the staff time to assess all they might be offered. Putting them on TH-cam certainly reaches a larger audience.
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