I suppose all this is about trying to recapture childhood as well as railway archaeology. In any event I really would like to see this viaduct as I cannot find any reference to it online or in any of the books that I have read. Google maps don't show anything.
Down the Goudhurst Road and this is the Station building (now a garage)
How old is the gate and fence, is it BR era or even Southern Railways era? By comparing an early photograph to this one I am glad to see that the exterior of the building is little changed, all the windows still exit but one chimney stack has gone and the main entrance has been replaced with large garage like doors. Horsmonden station had one 300 foot long platform on the west side of the track (or on the up side), a goods yard behind the platform with two sidings. On the other side of the track was a loop (which could allow trains to pass if one was shunted into it) which connected to a 625 yard long siding which faced a fruit packing plant from which fruit was packed into goods wagons via a loading bay. The station was almost 39 1/4 miles from Charing Cross and about 4 3/8 miles from Paddock Wood Station and about 50 meters above sea level.
In 1949 I believe this station had 50 season ticket holders (not enough to convince BR to continue operations ten years later (although three housing estates went up in the early 1960's), most income was still brought in from farm traffic). Still the village is larger now and more people have to commute (partly because some local industries collapsed after they closed the station) a few more
people today then perhaps?
It is said that there was bunting up in some of the streets of Horsmonden and people cheered the trains all down the line when they first ran. Perhaps it is hard to imagine now the feelings of liberation that the railway must have bought people. Growing up in a small rural community, enclosed in apple orchards and hop gardens and 'linked' to other places by narrow twisting lanes that never seem to get anywhere I can personally well imagine their feelings. A trip to Goudhurst Station less than two miles away but at least twice as far by road would have seemed like a different world.
It is said that there was bunting up in some of the streets of Horsmonden and people cheered the trains all down the line when they first ran. Perhaps it is hard to imagine now the feelings of liberation that the railway must have bought people. Growing up in a small rural community, enclosed in apple orchards and hop gardens and 'linked' to other places by narrow twisting lanes that never seem to get anywhere I can personally well imagine their feelings. A trip to Goudhurst Station less than two miles away but at least twice as far by road would have seemed like a different world.
Above a well known 1913 photograph of the station with two men and their dogs. The platform was faced with stone. The oast houses in the rear add to the nostalgic aura. Offset from the road these oasts still exist but are now a private dwelling.
A less common image of the north side of the station showing the little signal box, in the foreground grass is growing up from the long siding.
This image shows the exterior of the station in days before many people owned a car. An unattractive plate girder bridge conveyed trains over the Goudhurst Road up on an embankment for several hundred meters until it came level with the present day apple orchard in the later pictures of this particular post.
This image (apparently taken 10th June 1961) is taken from the long siding looking south. It gives a view towards the railway bridge, and to the right the goods yard and short sidings behind the platform.
Above, about 1 year before closure, H Class steam engine 31553 'blows off' as it arrives from Paddock Wood, these little engines were very reliable and ideal for branch line work from shunting or pushing and pulling carriages. This locomotive outlasted the operation of the line by barely a month. The apple packing plant is on the other side of the tracks and part of the loading bay is just discernable (with a number of oil barrels sitting on top). When I was about six I walked up this part of the track bed with my parents as the sandstone walls of the cutting rose over our heads, and distinctly remember rusting oil drums like these strewn across the track bed. The ugly hoses hanging down the train were for the air operated push-pull equipment.
Above a picture of the station painted in Southern Railway colours on the last day of service in the rain 11th June 1961. Despite the new paintwork, flowers were growing up through the platform cracks and tracks which contradicted the well maintained effect. All the stations had gas lamps on barley twist posts. The signal box was on the other side of the station building and had six levers.
A 'Farewell to Steam' event was held the day after official closure, the event was full of photographers, and this was the last train to carry passengers. This picture was taken from the track a little north of the station. This C class engine (more powerful than the standard H class locomotives of the time) still exists and is now privately owned according Vic Mitchell and Keith Smith in their book.
These oasts were just south of the station, they later used for warehousing china but are now flats. (Quite a lot of light industry appeared around the station during the railway era like Boddingtons factory). Behind the oast houses the plate girder bridge once carried the line over the road onto an embankment through fields and orchards towards Goudhurst Station.
An image of a steam locomotive sits on one of the cowl vanes.
This rocky wall obscured by trees dates back to the early station era and marked where the bridge was about to cross over the road.
Behind the oasts are yet more new houses which were built over the site of the embankment and the spoil was moved over the road to fill the remaining cutting north of the station site. It's nice that they named it after Mr Lambert (he had a collection of steam traction engines and steam farm machinery and these beasts would appear at village fetes.
The embankment or viaduct must be in this direction round the back of the oasts.
Bizarre. beyond the beautiful apple blossoms and over a fence seems to be a scrap yard for London buses. Just beyond the fence would be the site of the railway track.
Above a little of the trackbed. Note the old post on the left.
Down and to the north I can see an arch in the distance but it looks very private now and I don't want to scramble over the fence. I retrace my steps back the way I had come and look for an adjacent field nearer to the Goudhurst Road. Eventually I find one but it is lined with barbed wire. Anyway I hop over and accross two fields but it is starting to look private again. An elderly man calls out from his garden to ask if he can 'help' me and I am led into his garden. He seems very sympathetic when I explain what I am looking for. (It turns out that I am now at the back of the houses in Lamberts Place). Apparently two years before a group of teenagers had come along and smashed up the neighbour's caravan windows. As a consequence perhaps his neighbours are hostile to strangers. However, as his fence had blown down he let me pop through and sneak a couple of pictures. I can now see that it was never a viaduct but access under the embankment for farm traffic.
Found it!
The structure is built in the same redish brick as the tunnel and Swigs Hall Bridge. I should have taken more photographs. My childhood memories had become distorted as it was never a viaduct but just an embankment. Now it is quite obvious that the embankment drops down to the right and south (at 1 in 117).
