Doors open 6.30 pm. Refreshments available.
£5.00 entry charge for members, £7.00 for non members. This is a Pay at The Door Event.
On 5th February 1955, almost exactly 70 years ago, the last passenger train left Petworth. Over 10 years later the last freight train ran, ending just over a century of service. The story began in 1859 with the establishment of the Mid Sussex Railway which ran from Pulborough to Petworth. In 1866 the line was extended to Midhurst. By then the railway had been taken over by the London Brighton and South Coast Railway in 1923, then British Railways in 1948.
The end of the Second World War was to lead to a decline of the railway as road traffic increased with the growing availablilty of both fuel and cars for domestic use. This completed a cycle which had begun in 1794 with the Rother Navigation supplanting the Chichester to Petworth toll road as the preferred way of transporting goods, before it was in turn supplanted by the railway which provided a quicker and cheaper movement of goods as well as a passenger service. The railway had about a century as the prime method of transporting passengers and freight along the Rother Valley but its traffic, especially for passengers, was in decline by the 1950’s. On 5 February 1955, the line was closed for passenger trains and for freight on 20 May 1966.
Our speaker, Jock Gardner has had careers in the Royal Navy and the Civil Service. He has practiced naval history, writing and contributing to several books. A trustee of Coultershaw Heritage Trust, he is involved in running a working eighteenth century waterwheel and pump as we as being engaged with Haslemere u3a.