Part one - up to 1889 is here
The 1890s
In 1891 the Great Marlow Railway Company had carried 83,167 passengers they said of which 69,480 were third class ticket holders, 8255 second class and 4,414 first class with the remainder travelling on either parliament tickets (M.Ps) or season tickets. And of course an unspecified number of undetected fare dodgers.
Great fun experiences might start from our little if busy station. There were excursion trains running all the way to the coast that stopped at Marlow early in the morning. You could chose to return in 1, 4, 8 or 15 days usually. Club outings sometimes made use of the railway to visit London or the seaside, starting early and coming back late. Great times had by all.
Less happy were some of the traders in Marlow who objected to a sharp increase in the cost of sending goods by rail in 1893. What you paid depended on the category of goods you sent - buildings supplies travelled at discounted prices for example. They held a protest meeting in Marlow and sent a collective complaint to Great Western Railways and to their M.P. The new prices were "excessive, unfair and a hindrance to business in the town." It did no good.
Bourne End - the vilest station in the country?
Money was being invested in projected improvements at Bourne End station in 1893 including a new platform and a line so that trains could run onto the Marlow branch without shunting. Soon the train would soon be able to "reverse position without the shunting of carriages out of the station" they said. But ten months later a Marlow visitor there thought Bourne End a "fatal bar to the prosperity of Marlow" and "a disgrace to the neighborhood". He thought it was the most "vile" station in the country. What had happened to outrage our Victorian gentleman traveller? It did not provide a proper waiting room, only a Dutch barn like "miserable little shed" next to the booking office and on a day with biting cold winds he thought this was a misery too far. He said there were long delays while the train was shunted (no improvement yet in this then) and the procedure wasted the time in the way it was done. Overall he'd been subject to "cruel and inhospitable treatment." That man knew how to complain! Was the experience at Marlow any better? Another furious letter writer in 1898 thought no. There was a waiting room but he considered it miserable and draughty and thought it a shame it had to double up as the booking room and newspaper stand. And horror of horrors, on a cold and foggy morning, no foot warmers were to be had!
Flood
Floods in 1894 ( read more here) caused the Great Marlow Railway Co a considerable headache. A coal strike with resulting higher fuel costs and a commercial depression had caused problems with finances early in the year. Then the flood caused extensive repairs to be needed on the line, and the company still had to pay a share of the costs of the ongoing improvement work at Bourne End station and the long awaited repairs of that rickety railway bridge. The shareholders reported that parts of the line had been "washed away" and putting that right had cost £80 in terms of ballast and labour. Then the fencing along part of the track had come to a very bad state and they could not delay replacing it any longer. (This maintenance was done by the GWR who charged the GMRC to do it, but the latter did negotiate a cheaper rate for the fencing after some pleading.) Some people thought the engines in use on our line were getting past it as on several occasions the trains didn't run in 1894/5 as they couldn't get up steam. Vehicles (horse drawn of course) were sent to and from Marlow as a kind of rail replacement service. Overall the half year accounts in 1895 did not make "happy reading" for share holders. Great Western had operated the line in conjunction with the Great Marlow Railway Company from day one, and was a large shareholder in it. It was often suggested that Marlow should hand over control to GWR and these events renewed that call. In 1897 that's what happened
A new line to Henley?
This was also the decade plans were submitted to open a line between Marlow and Henley, complete with a viaduct*. It would cross the river at Marlow to the Berks side and then back over at Henley. The local papers reported that the majority of locals at more than one Marlow public meeting were in favour of the development, subject to the new Marlow station being positioned in what they thought would be in a favourable spot on the Bucks side of the Thames rather than at Bisham as first suggested. The existing Marlow station was apparently going to be retained for goods. Various people raised the thorny issue of where on the Bucks side the new station could be. Walter Lovegrove thought Crown Meadow (Riley Park now) would make an ideal site although that would have involved the demolition of a few buildings! Other suggestions were the Gossmore recreation ground and Colonel Wethered offered to donate land if the station was promised for the Bucks side but I don't know if he had a particular piece in mind.
Little Marlow parish council voted to support the idea if existing crossings were maintained. But not everyone was in favour. Some people thought the line would destroy the charming riverside scenery that attracted the visitor that bought so much trade. Alfred Heneage Cocks of Thames Bank thought that quicker journey times from London would mainly attract the lower class day tripper with little money to spend in the shops, and who were in any case only interested in beer and brass bands!
Residents of Bisham thought the embankment planned there would result in flooding and Marlow bridge would collapse under the weight of the extra traffic crossing if the station was on their side. Henry Allnutt of Henley thought there was no demand at all for a line between Marlow and Henley as "no traffic whatever exists between these two towns" which was obviously a slight exaggeration. Probably they'd struggle to find 12 people who'd want to travel in each direction a day he said. The plan went through various versions to try and meet local objections including the addition of a tunnel near Henley. The original one was dismissed by the Mayor of Henley as "the most barbarous plan that could be prepared in the kingdom of England". The Henley rowing club and the Thames Conservancy agreed and in the end the idea was scrapped.
The South Bucks Standard called this result a victory for selfishness especially on the part of local wealthy landowners. It said those they spoke of preserving the scenery while really only meaning to preserve it for their own enjoyment. They didn't care about those who wanted to come to enjoy it from elsewhere or for the livelihoods of the town's traders that depended on the tourist trade.
Vandalism
Those who were worried that the proposed line to Henley would bring in the riff raff should perhaps have remembered that Marlow had plenty of the home grown ones. There were frequent complaints at undesirable looking characters loitering about the station..bands of "dirty boys" in particular attracted the wrath of General Higginson. Children trespassed on the line, threw stones at the trains and tried to play in the good yard. Four such miscreants were caught in 1895, having broken the window of a horse box at the station with their stones. The magistrates said it was a pity they couldn't flog the lads, but settled on a 5s fine each. Guilty parties were Henry Arber, George Pearce, John Lovegrove, and Arthur Rockell.
It was not only lads hanging about that were regarded as nuisances - at least by the authorities. In the 1890s it was groups of men vying to offer luggage carrying services for better off travellers, especially at weekends. These tended to get warned off by station staff - only to return and try their luck a little latter. In 1894 they decided to make an example of Robert White of Dean Street who had been doing just that. He was fined 5s - with a warning that as his offence was technically that of trespass on the railway he had rendered himself liable for a £5 penalty which would be inflicted if he came before them again. If the railway co hoped this would stop the touting, they were wrong. It should be remembered the 1890s were a period of continuous agricultural and trade depression in Marlow and there was a lot of men out of work.
Marlow improvements
More goods traffic saw new sidings put down at Marlow in 1898. The old ones were regarded as perpetually over crowded. It did not help when goods supposed to collected from the station were left there. Especially if the goods concerned were several dozen truckloads of manure. This happened in 1898. The "emanations from the manure were most offensive". The owner, Mr G Field of Wood End was given 24 hours to remove the lot or it would be auctioned off on site. He seems to have been roused to action.
The station building got a thorough overhaul in 1899 and was repainted. The "old and ugly" fencing about it was also replaced with iron fencing then.
As for Bourne End. Was it still letting the side down? Well there were two main complaints now. First up was the "abysmal" lighting which was still by oil lamp. Second was the fact there was a curve in the Marlow platform there which meant that while the front and the back of the carriage almost touched the platform, the middle part was 2 foot away. This seems an extraordinary gap indeed. So did the passenger in 1900 that on a dark night stepped into the "abyss" and was injured. He was not the only one to have suffered in this way he said. No wonder by the sounds of it!
*There was also an 1845 plan to link Marlow and Henley by rail, as part of the Thames Valley line between Slough and Oxford. This would also have gone via Beaconsfield, High Wycombe, Wallington and Thame. In the same year the proposed Oxford, Windsor and Reigate railway would have included a stop at Marlow too. (And Windsor, Maidenhead, Staines, Chertsey, Weybridge and Epsom.)
Written and researched by Kathryn Day.
Related Posts:
Biography of Joseph James the guard on the first train over the branch line to Marlow in 1873 -
Biography of Marlow's first station master W T Porter here
Soho Terrace - home to many station staff in the Victorian era - here
Index of other transport related posts and general Marlow history : here
Timeline and proprietors of Railway Hotel: here
To find every mention of an individual or family here see the A-Z person index in the top drop down menu.
Sources include:
Bradshaw Railway Manual - Shareholders Guide and Official Directory, 1890. (1890, W J Adams and Sons)
The Builder - Jan 8 1898, Internet Archive.
Kelly's Directory 1889 & 1903
Cairns, A J - The Book of Marlow (1976, Barracuda Books)
Darlington, H R - The Railway Rates and the Carriage of Goods, as sanctioned by Parliament - (1898, Stevens and Sons)
Popplewell, Lawrence - A gazetteer of the railway contractors and engineers of Central England 1830-1914 (1986, Melledwen)
Wells, Mathew and Tilley, Michael 100 Years of the Marlow Donkey (Marlow and Maidenhead Passengers Association 1973)
Journals of the House of Commons 1867-1868. HMSO
Berkshire Chronicle - 11 Oct 1845, Bucks Advertiser and Aylesbury News - 7th October 1871, 22nd October & 28th December 1895, Bucks Gazette 4th October 1845, Bucks Herald - 27 Jan & 13th October 1866, 1st December 1883, Maidenhead Advert 4th December 1872, 9th April 1884, 21st April 1886, Nottinghamshire Guardian - 18 March 1870, Reading Mercury - 1st December 1855, 21 December 1872, 18th January, 1st March, 6th December 1873, 24th November 1874, South Bucks Standard: 31st March & 8th December 1893, 20th July & 30th March 1894, 2nd December 1897, 28th January, 18th Feb, 4th March, 1st & 22nd April 1898, 13th Jan & 18th November 1899, 28 Sept 1900, Windsor and Eton Express - 22 March & 4th October 1873, 3rd October 1874 - British Newspaper Archive via the BNA.
Marlow Guide 1903.
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