The Mansfield Railway
The Mansfield Railway was a short (~11 mile) line built to serve collieries in Nottinghamshire. Running between Clipstone and Kirkby-in-Ashfield, it broken an existing Midland Railway monopoly, and was also useful as a through line for steel traffic and fast fish. It opened in 1916, and eventually closed in 2003 after the last collieries closed.
History / Timeline
The first railway in the Mansfield area was the Mansfield and Pinxton Railway of 1819. This was a horse-drawn tramway that carried coal from the Cromford Canal. The Midland Railway arrived in 1849 and was widely believed to be taking advantage of its monopoly position with the new collieries which were opening in the area.
The Lancashire, Derbyshire & East Coast Railway (LD&ECR) obtained authorisation for a branch to Mansfield, but was never in a financial position to build it. Throughout the latter half of the 19th century, there were various attempts to get the Great Northern Railway (GNR) or GCR to build a competing line, but these all led to failure.
At the turn of the century, more pits were being sunk in the area, and the local colliery owners decided that they would have to build a railway themselves. The proposal had the backing of sufficient land owners over which the railway would pass, and received the support of Sam Fay and the GCR. The proposal's Act of Parliament passed on 26th July 1910 - a very late date for a private railway company to be approved. Agreements were quickly signed with local collieries and for the GCR to operate the railway.
Land ownership issues slowed the initial building, but the first section from Mansfield Colliery to Clipstone opened on 16th June 1913. This was followed by the section from Mansfield to Mansfield Collier in June 1914.
With the outbreak of World War 1, the Government took control of the railways including the partially built Mansfield Railway. Unlike most railways, this proved to be beneficial to the Mansfield. A case was made that opening the through line would reduce Admiralty coal shipping costs from South Wales to Grimsby and the East Coast. The Railway Executive Committee agreed, and paid to complete the line. The case was helped by the fact that an Army Camp was being built at Clipstone, and would greatly benefit from a rail connection.
By January 1916, railway construction was running behind schedule and the contractors had to be threatened with a weekly fine of £100. The through route was finally completed and opened in July 1916. A Board of Trade inspection in January 1917 was successful with the proviso that a speed limit of 25mph was imposed until the various banks and other earthworks had consolidated.
The Mansfield Railway opened to passenger traffic on 2nd April 1917, with statins at Mansfield, Sutton-in-Ashfield Central, and Kirkby-in-Ashfield Central. Although many short coal railways had passenger aspirations, they would usually close in only a few months or years. Despite the rapid growth of bus competition, the Mansfield Railway was unusual and managed to keep its passenger services going for 38 years. At their peak in the late 1930s, Mansfield Central had 14 passenger trains a day to Nottingham Victoria, and 12 in return. There was even a short-lived direct service to Maerylebone.
Further openings in 1918 increased the line's usefulness. The Mansfield Railway took possession of a set of concentration sidings on 1st January; the western curve on the Clipstone branch opened on 18th March; and the Rufford colliery branch opened on 8th July.
With Grouping (1923), it was natural that the Mansfield Railway's close associations with the GCR would lead to them joining the LNER together. The colliery workings would continue to develop into the deeper coal field to the east, and the Mansfield Railway was in a good position to take advantage of this. The existing concentration sidings were reaching their limit, and an additional 14 new sidings were added in 1927. These were followed in 1928 with a branch to the new Bilsthorpe Colliery. Coal workings from the Mansfield Railway fed into the former GCR yard at Annesley. From there, they would often join the Windcutter which the LNER would introduce in 1947.
As with World War 1, the Mansfield Railway served a local military camp in World War 2. This time it was an American military hospital which was built in Mansfield in 1942. This was the first military hospital of its type in Britain, and was deliberately sited away from high risk targets. The Mansfield proved particularly useful in bringing the wounded after the Normandy Landings in 1944. The site is now the Kings Mill Hospital.
After Nationalisation (1948), traffic continued to boom with new colliery developments. Most of the coal was shipped to power stations along the Trent, but some was sent further afield. The fast fish traffic from Grimsby also continued to use the line with three trains a day, and one van to be left at Mansfield. Although freight and coal were booming, efficient bus services were finally taking their toll on the passenger traffic. Passenger services finally ended on New Year's Eve 1955. Excursion and holiday traffic would occasionally use the line through the 1960s.
Mirroring the decline of general freight across the entire BR network, general freight services were withdrawn in June 1966 and the Mansfield goods yard was closed. The line west of Mansfield Colliery no longer served any useful purpose and this closed in August 1966. Of course this also marked the end of the Mansfield Railway as an alternative through route for fish and steel traffic.
Traffic from the collieries east of Mansfield continued to be strong. Most of these collieries were served by both ex-LMS and ex-LNER lines. Rationalisation by BR led to the closure of most of the ex-LMS connections, and retention of the Mansfield / LNER ones. Further increases in efficiency were provided by the introduction of "Merry-go-round" operations in the 1970s. These required the construction of 'balloon' sidings at the collieries and power stations, and closure of the concentration sidings.
The beginning of the end would be the aftermath of the 1984-5 Miners Strike. Mansfield Colliery closed in 1988, Blidsworth in 1989, and Rufford in 1993. RJB (and later UK Coal) took ownership of the remaining privatised mines. Bilsthorpe was closed in 1994, re-opened, and then finally closed in 1997. Clipstone was closed in 1993 by the NCB, but was re-opened by RJB in 1994 under lease. This finally closed in April 2003. After all of the mines were closed, UK Coal did try to retain use of the Rufford Colliery site, and the adjoining branch was kept open. However by 2007, train movements were rare and the line was suffering from vandalism. Attempts were made to fix the vandalism, but an attempt to re-open the line in late 2007 by EWS was thwarted by missing signalling equipment and the theft of rails. All attempts to re-open the branch were officially ended by Network Rail in early 2008.
Locomotives
The Mansfield Railway was operated by the Great Central Railway, and a range of GCR locomotives could be seen in the early days. J11 'pom-poms' were common, but ex-LD&ECR M1 0-6-4Ts were not unknown. With growing coal traffic, O4 'ROD' 2-8-0s were frequently used, and after Grouping, these were joined by Gresley O1 and O2 2-8-0s. After World War 2, O7 WD 'Austerities' were added to the mix, and BR would introduce 9Fs to the heavy coal traffic.
Fast fish traffic was typically hauled by Thompson B1s and Gresley K3s. Britannia Pacifics would also make an appearance after being cascaded from their original duties by new diesel motive power. The Britannias were allocated to Immingham and could be seen on the fast freights between 1961 and 1963.
A range of tank engines were used for local passenger services. Robinson C14 4-4-2Ts and Worsdell G3 0-4-4Ts provided early services. The LNER also introduced Ivatt C12 4-4-2Ts and Ivatt N1 0-6-2Ts.
After the withdrawal of steam, BR introduced Class 31 diesels on the coal trains. Class 47s were introduced to haul the 'merry-go-round' trains in the 1970s, and these would continue to haul some of the last services. Other diesels seen on the coal traffic included Classes 20, 56, 58, and 66.
Accidents
On 2nd September 1950, a passenger service hauled by a Gresley N2 0-6-2T became derailed. Luckily there were only three passengers onboard, and there were no serious injuries amongst passengers and railway staff. The Ministry of Transport Report is online.
Further Reading
- "The Mansfield Railway", by Robert Western, Oakwood Press No. 165, 2019.
Acknowledgments
The map of the Mansfield Railway is from Wikimedia and licensed under the CCA-SA 4.0 license. The original image can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mansfield-rly.png
