» Take a shopping trip back to when things were a bit different
THE dramatic colour photographs you see here were taken by Richard Chatham, who recalled the tragic rail accident that took place at Ashchurch this week in 1969.
Richard’s account appeared in the Nostalgia section of the Echo and Citizen in 2015.
“On March 8, 1969, a serious crash occurred at Ashchurch station causing fatalities. The trains involved were the 10.40am Bristol to Newcastle express and a local goods train.
“The express had made its call at Cheltenham and departed north for Birmingham and the north east and was running at full speed as it passed through Ashchurch station.
“On the down line a coal train with 57 loose coupled unbraked trucks from Washford Heath to Stoke Gifford was approaching Ashchurch at considerable speed.
“The trucks started to snake and as they crossed the points for the crossover, they began to derail and caught the back two coaches of the up line express.
“Two passengers died and 45 were injured in the resulting crash and the line was closed for some considerable time as the wreckage was removed and the track bed relayed. Two of British Railways’ largest steam cranes were brought into service to clear the track. I took the photos seen here of the recovery work.
“A similar accident at Ashchurch took place on January 8, 1929, which also resulted in fatalities and was reported in the press. In this accident the 7.20pm from Bristol to Leeds express mail train crashed into goods wagons that were being shunted across from the up line to the down line at the same point the later accident occurred.
“In the 1929 accident, the driver, two passengers and a company operative were killed and 11 injured passengers and Post Office workers on the train were treated in Tewkesbury Hospital. It was reported that the accident happened in thick fog.”
Clifford Day, who took the black and white photos of Ashchurch station you see here, had happier memories of “the last days of the branch lines to Tewkesbury, Upton and Malvern and the line to Beckford, Evesham and on to Barnt Green in Birmingham.
“A line from Broom Junction served Stratford upon Avon where it joined the Honeybourne line from Cheltenham. The Evesham line was well known for its vegetable trains which picked up loaded trucks at Beckford, Salford Priors and other small stations along the way and left them at Evesham and other connections with the main lines where they went off to London and other cities for the fruit and veg markets early the next day.
“The line was built in the 1860s to connect those communities that were not served by the mainline and provided a bypass for trains avoiding the Lickey incline.
“The Tewkesbury branch naturally served Tewkesbury’s two stations. One branch went into town where there was an engine shed where Dowty’s used to stand by the swimming pool car park, then crossed the Oldbury Road to the High Street station behind what was Vic Watson’s Tewkesbury Car Mart in Sun Street. The old station platform and what was left of the buildings became Martin and Bennetts Corn and Seed depot.
“That line crossed the High Street and went down to Healings Mill where trucks were loaded with sacks of flour and drawn back up to the station to be attached to trains. Several methods of dragging up to the High Street were used, the last being, I believe, an old Fordson Tractor.
“The other branch went into the more modern station down Station Road. Here there was Ministry Warehouse. From the station the line ran out over the Bredon Road, across the river where the Bailey Bridge is now and through the My the by tunnel.
“The line crossed the Severn just south of Upton upon Severn. After the station at Upton it ran through Tunnel Hill and on towards Malvern crossing the Welland Road just right of where the model railway is now.
“The line then swept around the Three Counties Showground just nipping the top corner on a big curve and then along the eastern boundary of the Malvern Hills Golf Course, joining the main line half a mile further on.”