1920s/30s stone wagons

[Sophia NSE]

Can anyone help me with which wagons would be used for stone/quarry traffic in the 1920s/30s, particularly in the Kent area? Thanks in advance 

[Mark Forrest]

Not Kent, but a similar era was discussed here:

 

[Rivercider]

During the 1920s Foster Yeoman purchased 150  Gloucester R C & W, five plank wagons to a 12t design, they carried  Foster Yeoman livery. GWR owned vehicles were also used. Some of the output went to the South and South East. 

 

cheers.  

[Nearholmer]

Kent isn't a major stone quarrying area. Its traditional high-quality building stone was ragstone, which is a grey limestone, and sandstone was used in the areas where decent-quality stuff outcrops, notably around Tunbridge Wells, and along the Kent-Sussex border.

 

I'm not as "well up" on industrial railways in Kent as I am on East Sussex, but off-hand I'm not aware of any of the ragstone quarries being rail-connected. I'll keep looking for private sidings in the 1935 Sectional appendix, but the only one so far is at Westbere between Sturry and Grove Ferry, which took SR engineer's department wagons, I think to collect river terrace gravel for use as ballast, plus all the various shingle pits in the Dungeness area.

 

Gravel, shingle (no sand), and 'beach' (mixed shingle and sand) was ideally carried in drop-sided wagons, but if you look at pictures of the Dungeness area I think you will find all sorts of general-purpose open wagons, including old "bedstead" ones in use for the traffic at your date. (If modelling this, remember that these are very dense loads, so probably not loaded more than 3 or 4 planks up)

 

Lime and chalk were also carried in open wagons.

 

There was a fair bit of concrete-product manufacture in Kent too, so you might see "patent stone" products being transported too.

 

Slate was almost certainly still coming by rail at that period, and there is a separate thread (or is it buried in a pre-grouping wagon-loads discussion?) covering that.

 

 

 

 

Edited March 2, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Nearholmer]

To add: the SR itself was a huge user of imported stone in Kent in the 1930s, because of the big re-ballasting programme started in the wake of the Sevenoaks derailment, where traditional shingle ballast came under an unfavourable light. That stone came from Meldon Quarry, in bogie hopper wagons designed for the job.

 

Imported high-quality building stone, as opposed to broken stone, would probably have come in the low-sided open wagons specially built for that sort of load, some of which were PO, others railway owned. Good item about an LSWR one here https://farthinglayouts.blogspot.com/2015/05/lswr-stone-wagon.html

 

 

 

 

Edited March 2, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Sophia NSE]

It's for a light railway with a link to a quarry. The railway itself was the unconstructed extension of the KESR, but my layout is an interpretation of what could have been built

[Nearholmer]

Well, you could be in the right geology for a rag stone quarry once you get up near Maidstone https://www.gallagher-group.co.uk/kentish-ragstone-geology

 

I suggest low-sided wagons for dressed stone, and 3 or 4 plank for broken stone, if you are to have special-purpose wagons.

 

Here’s a health and safety nightmare from the right time and locale https://www.alamy.com/quarrying-kentish-ragstone-in-tovil-kent-1936-image359775405.html

Edited March 2, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Sophia NSE]

4 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Well, you could be in the right geology for a rag stone quarry once you get up near Maidstone https://www.gallagher-group.co.uk/kentish-ragstone-geology

 

I suggest low-sided wagons for dressed stone, and 3 or 4 plank for broken stone, if you are to have special-purpose wagons.

 

Here’s a health and safety nightmare from the right time and locale https://www.alamy.com/quarrying-kentish-ragstone-in-tovil-kent-1936-image359775405.html

Funnily enough my light railway runs from Maidstone and through Tovil out to Chart Sutton, with a branch to Boughton quarry

[Nearholmer]

What an excellent scenario.

[Wickham Green too]

Then there's tarred stone for roadmaking : mucky stuff that you wouldn't want to put anything in a wagon after - so superannuated wagons that'll be pensioned off after a few trips ( there are examples in the SR Wagons books ) or Private Owner wagons built for the purpose e.g. Tarmac.

[Nearholmer]

Being a sad fellow, I did google around yesterday trying to discover whether highways in Kent at this period were made from tarred stone, or whether they were still at the stage of spraying tar over a dry road-surface to stabilise it, and the answer is "dunno".

 

Pre-WW1, I found extracts of council minutes that are very clearly about over-spraying, and post-WW2 they were certainly using tarred stone on main highways. I think tarred-stone probably came into use on main roads between the wars, when there were upgrades of things like the A1 and A21, but "a dribble of tar, and a dressing of grit" was still in-use on residential and minor roads into the 1960s (I remember seeing it being done, and in East Sussex they were still using pea-shingle, designed to make you fall off your bike, until c1970 - bl@@dy awful stuff!). And, even now there a few "grass down the middle" very minor highways in rural Kent that don't look as if they've been resurfaced since WW2. 

 

A tarred-stone plant would allow some interesting tank wagons. South Eastern Tar Distillers had horrible stinky plants at Tonbridge, Canterbury, Rye Harbour, and maybe a couple of other places, and years (decades!) ago there was a drawing of one of their tank wagons in one of the modelling magazines, liveried under their previous name of Forbes, Abbott, and Leonard (these three guys practically invented the tar distilling industry, and had huge plants in London too). [It looks as if Dapol make a rectangular tank wagon in S-E TD livery, although whether the model is accurate, I don't know.]

 

I told you I was sad!

 

 

 

 

Edited March 3, 2021 by Nearholmer

[Mark Saunders]

For post WW2 the Trunk Roads were nationalised a situation that still exists with the Highways Agency!

[Sophia NSE]

7 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

Being a sad fellow, I did google around yesterday trying to discover whether highways in Kent at this period were made from tarred stone, or whether they were still at the stage of spraying tar over a dry road-surface to stabilise it, and the answer is "dunno".

 

Pre-WW1, I found extracts of council minutes that are very clearly about over-spraying, and post-WW2 they were certainly using tarred stone on main highways. I think tarred-stone probably came into use on main roads between the wars, when there were upgrades of things like the A1 and A21, but "a dribble of tar, and a dressing of grit" was still in-use on residential and minor roads into the 1960s (I remember seeing it being done, and in East Sussex they were still using pea-shingle, designed to make you fall off your bike, until c1970 - bl@@dy awful stuff!). And, even now there a few "grass down the middle" very minor highways in rural Kent that don't look as if they've been resurfaced since WW2. 

 

A tarred-stone plant would allow some interesting tank wagons. South Eastern Tar Distillers had horrible stinky plants at Tonbridge, Canterbury, Rye Harbour, and maybe a couple of other places, and years (decades!) ago there was a drawing of one of their tank wagons in one of the modelling magazines, liveried under their previous name of Forbes, Abbott, and Leonard (these three guys practically invented the tar distilling industry, and had huge plants in London too). [It looks as if Dapol make a rectangular tank wagon in S-E TD livery, although whether the model is accurate, I don't know.]

 

I told you I was sad!

 

 

 

 

Being a Kentish Maid currently exiled in East Sussex I know all about those awful pea shingle roads and pavements!

[Artless Bodger]

On 03/03/2021 at 10:30, Nearholmer said:

Being a sad fellow, I did google around yesterday trying to discover whether highways in Kent at this period were made from tarred stone, or whether they were still at the stage of spraying tar over a dry road-surface to stabilise it, and the answer is "dunno".

 

Pre-WW1, I found extracts of council minutes that are very clearly about over-spraying, and post-WW2 they were certainly using tarred stone on main highways. I think tarred-stone probably came into use on main roads between the wars, when there were upgrades of things like the A1 and A21, but "a dribble of tar, and a dressing of grit" was still in-use on residential and minor roads into the 1960s (I remember seeing it being done, and in East Sussex they were still using pea-shingle, designed to make you fall off your bike, until c1970 - bl@@dy awful stuff!). And, even now there a few "grass down the middle" very minor highways in rural Kent that don't look as if they've been resurfaced since WW2. 

 

A tarred-stone plant would allow some interesting tank wagons. South Eastern Tar Distillers had horrible stinky plants at Tonbridge, Canterbury, Rye Harbour, and maybe a couple of other places, and years (decades!) ago there was a drawing of one of their tank wagons in one of the modelling magazines, liveried under their previous name of Forbes, Abbott, and Leonard (these three guys practically invented the tar distilling industry, and had huge plants in London too). [It looks as if Dapol make a rectangular tank wagon in S-E TD livery, although whether the model is accurate, I don't know.]

 

I told you I was sad!

 

 

 

 

This is interesting, I am trying to find some information about a tar distillation works at Aylesford, which we knew as Johnsons but seems to have been a works of the South Eastern Tar Distillers, hence finding the link to this topic on google and this:

https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/1959_Chemical_Manufacturers_Directory:_Chemical_Manufacturers

The plant was visible from the railway line at the south end of the Aylesford Paper Mill site, (I remember cylindrical tank wagons in there when passing when a child), and interestingly maps show rail access only from the APM internal system, despite the tar works being only a short distance from Aylesford station goods yard. 

It had been demolished by the time I worked at APM, but our two clarifiers at that end of the site were always known as 'Johnsons' clarifiers, reference apparently to the old tar plant. Our internal sidings had a loop alongside the coal pile, still extant but unused by my time (EM boiler house having shut down) the neck at the south end of the loop went through a gate in our tide wall to serve the tar works. 

According to the Graces Guide web site, naptha was a byproduct, we used quite a lot of naptha in the mill (in plain metal barrels with two I section rings around them) for degreasing and also particularly to wash pitch (from sulphite pulp) off the phosphor bronze wires, probably initially obtained from the tar works (moved on internal user wagons?)

You mention the plant at Rye - there is an interesting site about the industries along the Rye Harbour branch which I found after a holiday visit to Rye Harbour (there's an ex-SER coach body too). Narrow gauge tramways used to move shingle to the chemical plant (it still exists as a solvent recovery plant). This was on the opposite side of the river Rother from the Colonel Stephens Rye and Camber Tramway.

https://www.ryeharbour.net/list.asp?field=albums&album=Industry&crit=6  See page 2 for aerial photos of the tar works and tar lagoon (shades of the La Brea Tar Pits!).

 

Regarding rail connection to ragstone quarries - there was a short siding for the Allington quarries, seen on maps on the NLS site, this was later extended (late '60s or early '70s) and then used for inwards aggregate traffic to the ARC site, the main quarry having been worked out by then. One of my maternal uncles worked in quarries at Allington, I'm not sure which but probably this one (now the site of the 20:20 Industrial Park and waste incinerator) as iirc he said once that trains were loaded directly on the main line, which seemed a bit implausible but there was a high concrete bank visible from the Castle Road overbridge at the time. The quarry internal narrow gauge line served a wharf on the river downstream of the locks (tidal limit of the Medway). Other quarries up river nearer Maidstone had NG tramways, visible in photos of Allington Castle on the Britain From The Air site, but these seem to mainly lead to the river. Up river, beyond Maidstone there were extensive quarries (in the same stone belt which cuts across the Medway bend) from Tovil right through to Boughton and beyond, though none appear to have had any rail connection or internal systems, though we did find remains of an NG line in Bydews Wood near the river. Historically a lot of the ragstone was taken out by water to London, Tovil quarries supplied 'gun stones' cannon balls in Henrican times (I think there are a few in Maidstone Museum (an excellent local museum, well worth a visit)). Getting stone out of the quarries further up the Loose valley would have involved some steep roads, unless it was all taken down the valley to Tovil, and there were no continuous roads along the valley bottom all the way, building the Maidstone and Headcorn railway would have been a boon to stone traffic, even if only to feed river wharves.

 

 

 

[Nearholmer]

Interesting stuff!

 

My mother still has in her garden a stone cannon ball, which my father found on one of his rambles, and carried home!

(family trait possibly, in that I lugged a Ffestiniog rail chair about ten miles across the hills in my rucksack)

 

If you want to find a bit more about the narrow gauge railways at Rye Harbour, I wrote a fairly detailed article for “The Narrow Gauge”, which later got reproduced in “Tenterden Terrier”, getting on for forty years ago, when there were still a few guys around who had worked on them pre-WW2.

[Tom Burnham]

The SE&CR had a quarry at Allington, with an internal narrow gauge tramway (don't think it had locos though).

When sorting 1920s wagon labels at the Col Stephens Railway Museum at Tenterden, I noted quite a few incoming wagons of roadstone for the County Council highways people. KCC had quite a programme of road improvement and tarring post WW1.

[Invicta]

On 03/03/2021 at 10:30, Nearholmer said:

A tarred-stone plant would allow some interesting tank wagons. South Eastern Tar Distillers had horrible stinky plants at Tonbridge, Canterbury, Rye Harbour, and maybe a couple of other places, and years (decades!) ago there was a drawing of one of their tank wagons in one of the modelling magazines, liveried under their previous name of Forbes, Abbott, and Leonard (these three guys practically invented the tar distilling industry, and had huge plants in London too). [It looks as if Dapol make a rectangular tank wagon in S-E TD livery, although whether the model is accurate, I don't know.]

 

I told you I was sad!

 

 

There's a piece on S-E Tar Distillers in the John Arkell "Private Owner Wagons of the South-East" book, which is illustrated with pics of two rectangular tanks, and one of a cylindrical tank, photographed at Tonbeidge and Tunbridge Wells West in the 1950's. The  livery on Dapol's wagon appears to be a fair match for one of the photos, other than a slight lettering variation (the use of  'Ltd' and 'Ld' as an abbreviation for 'Limited'), which is similar to another wagon partially shown in the same pic.

[phil_sutters]

On 06/05/2021 at 13:15, Nearholmer said:

Interesting stuff!

 

My mother still has in her garden a stone cannon ball, which my father found on one of his rambles, and carried home!

(family trait possibly, in that I lugged a Ffestiniog rail chair about ten miles across the hills in my rucksack)

 

If you want to find a bit more about the narrow gauge railways at Rye Harbour, I wrote a fairly detailed article for “The Narrow Gauge”, which later got reproduced in “Tenterden Terrier”, getting on for forty years ago, when there were still a few guys around who had worked on them pre-WW2.

There is also a section on the standard and narrow gauge railways and tramways around Rye in Paul O'Callaghan's East Sussex Coastal Railways - Volime 2: Branch Lines and Other Railways.