TANFIELD 300
September 1825 has gone down as a key date in the history of the railways. But the unfortunate truth for Stockton & Darlington Railway fans is that while the line from Witton Park to Stockton was new, most of the technology was not. A little over 30 miles away, one railway is hoping that 2025 will help it to shine a fresh light on the evolution of railways a century earlier.
The New Year was kicked off in style with the nationwide ‘Whistle-Up’ to start Railway 200 celebrations. One of the most active on January 1 was the Tanfield Railway in County Durham. It turned out eight locomotives to take part in the whistling, five of them steam, and managed to secure a slot on BBC Breakfast news.
For Tanfield, the year 2025 isn’t about a 200th anniversary – but its 300th anniversary. What’s more, it’s not just a big birthday party being planned for ‘Tanfield 300’, as General Manager David Watchman told us, it’s a wholesale programme of work designed to change perspectives about railway history centred around this milestone anniversary.
“It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity,” says David. “We do want to look back at the end of the year and think ‘wow’ we’ve put on a really good show. But we also want to have reached new audiences and made people realise that there’s a lot more to early railway history.”
A lot of history
In the case of the Tanfield route, there really is a whole lot more to early railway history too. Working backwards from what everyone at Tanfield somehow considers to be ‘modern’ history perhaps best illustrates just how much. In 1839, the Tanfield line became part of the Brandling Junction Railway. That’s not a railway name on the tip of many tongues in 2025, but for a period the BJR route into Gateshead was part of the first iteration of the East Coast Main Line. The Tanfield line became arguably the world’s first fully fledged branch line. During the Brandling Junction period, the Tanfield route had its own passenger service and recent research suggests that limited steam locomotive operation could have been introduced by the 1840s too (about 40 years earlier than previously believed).
The southern section of the current Tanfield Railway is something of a historical enigma. It was definitely there by 1839 and probably a lot earlier, but the historical information is complicated by the fact that there have been at least four different arms of the Tanfield route through the area. One served pits in Tanfield village and one served East Tanfield colliery via the western bank of the Causey burn; both via the famous Causey Arch (which we’ll return to shortly). Then there was a route from Causey to pits essentially opposite the front gate of what is now Beamish Museum. And, finally, the route that exists now down the eastern side of the Causey burn. Three of those four are definitely 1720s routes, whereas the exact date of the current route is a bit of a mystery – there’s evidence to suggest that it was a lot earlier than 1839, but nothing conclusive.
From Causey northwards things get a bit more certain. Causey Arch was completed in 1727 to take the aforementioned routes to the Tanfield area. Indeed, when it was built it was commonly referred to as the Tanfield arch. It was widely celebrated and has a span of more than double the later fêted Skerne Bridge on the Stockton & Darlington Railway built almost exactly a century later.
Rails reached the Causey area in 1725. And when we say rails, I’m sure that someone will be immediately declaring them invalid because at the time they were made from wood. It’s true, they were – but this was a long way from primitive beginnings. In areas of heavy traffic, the rails were topped with iron plates. There were points, albeit without moving switch rails it would seem, turntables, double, and even triple track. How do we know all of this? Because the Tanfield line was seen as such a game changer at the time, engineers from around the world came to see it. One was a Frenchman named Gabriel Jars and his highly detailed contemporary drawings survive.
The remaining two miles of the current Tanfield Railway to Sunniside also date to 1725, as did most of the rest of the route down to the River Tyne. But just to emphasise the sheer scale of the evolution that took place in railed transport in this part of the world, one section of the line to the Tyne reused an earlier waggonway route; none other than the Whickham Grand Lease way of 1621. That’s not a typo, it really did date back to 20 years before the English Civil War. And before anyone splits hairs about the terms ‘railway’, ‘waggonway’, ‘railroad’, or whatever – they were all used interchangeably by the early 18th Century. The word ‘rail’ in this use seemingly has its origin in those who first described what to them looked like a fence on its side. Tanfield’s claim to be the world’s oldest working railway is a solid one.
Doing it justice
Trying to do justice to that history sounds like one heck of a challenge, but it’s one that the team at Tanfield have certainly not shied away from. Key to their plans is a short stretch of trackbed where those routes to Tanfield diverged adjacent to the current Causey Arch station. It was last used in the 1930s when the London & North Eastern Railway moved its rails right across to the edge of the cutting here as part of a package of works to avoid subsidence. Now it’s going to be re-laid, not with steel or iron rails, but with wooden ones.
The trackbed itself has already been prepared for the rebuilding. By the time you read this, woodwork should be already under way with a planned completion of mid-summer. It’s not just symbolic rails that are being re-laid though. Up at the railway’s Marley Hill workshops, the construction of a replica waggon is also beginning. The waggon will no doubt open a few eyes too as it will clearly demonstrate where what became the ‘chaldron’ waggon and its larger descendants that were widespread until just before the First World War really came from. Impressively, but not unusually for the independently spirited Tanfield Railway, all of the work is being done in-house following extensive research. Naturally, occasional 1720s-style horse haulage is also in its sights.
“It will give a direct comparison with the current railway,” David says. “Visitors will be able to see just how much the ‘modern’ railway has in common with the 1720s railway. It also means that the world’s oldest working railway will get a little longer.”
The launch event for the recreated waggonway is pencilled in for July 19/20 with a very historically focused event using the current railway, mainly as a means of transport to get people to Causey where they will be able to learn more about early railways. Somewhat appropriately, at the opposite end of the station, Causey Arch’s bay platform is also being re-laid, with steel rails (90lb bullhead to be precise), to accommodate mobile visitor facilities during the event. Funding has been secured to adapt a vehicle for the purpose in the medium term to give regular facilities for this idyllic station in a very unusual and historically sensitive location.
Locomotive innovators
It’d be wrong to think that David’s plans are focused on the very early days of railways and horse traction. It must be remembered that the coal-owning families that created the Tanfield route in the 1700s were the same ones who funded George Stephenson in the 1800s – the legendary ‘Grand Allies’.
“The thing that makes what happened here really exciting is that there was this essentially unbroken line from the 1620s to at least the 1920s or 1930s where this part of the world was at the forefront of railway development,” enthused David. “From the wooden waggonway era right through the birth of the steam locomotive and up to the development of early diesel and electric locomotives, Tyneside was the place it was all happening. Even the offshoots of development with the likes of early steam locomotives at Middleton Colliery in Leeds or the Stockton & Darlington Railway itself, all happened with Tyneside expertise at their core.
“It’s really something that the North East can be proud of. And virtually everyone who lives here has family that worked in coal mining, ship building, steel works or the railways that served them. Many people in the North East have a link to the history we’re trying to showcase.”
To try and do justice to all of that, Tanfield has changed its events programme completely for 2025. The focus is on heritage and historical events while some familiar favourites such as the line’s 1940s weekend have been rested.
The year kicks off on February 23 with an event aimed squarely at the local community, acknowledging that very often people don’t visit the heritage on their doorstep. No fewer than 300 free tickets are being given to local people and groups to encourage them to change that habit. Befitting a launch event for ‘Tanfield 300’ as the programme has inevitably been dubbed, there’ll also be freight trains in action and a more intensive timetable than normal for a Sunday in February.
Freight to the fore
An increased number of freight trains is unsurprisingly a theme for the whole of 2025. What is surprising is that freight trains at Tanfield are now turning a profit. A brake van suitable for ‘ride on’ freight trains was brought to the railway in 2024. It carries the identity of a lost ex-London Midland & Scottish Railway-built brake van sold to the National Coal Board for use at a North East colliery. It has allowed Tanfield to introduce ‘guard experiences’ where participants shadow a qualified guard and even don appropriate costume on board a freight train. The venture means that running a demonstration freight train has gone from a loss-making decision of the heart into a viable business choice – especially where it can be combined with a footplate experience offer. David has high hopes that the concept can be expanded and improved in the years to come.
Tanfield’s investment hasn’t just gone into brake vans. In March the railway will officially relaunch one of its stars back into traffic – Robert Stephenson & Co.-built 0 6 0T No. 3 Twizell. Constructed in 1891 for James Joicey’s colliery empire, this elegant machine was ironically destined to work on the route from the collieries around Beamish that replaced one arm of the Tanfield waggonway. Twizell is currently on a very long-term loan from Beamish Museum and has just returned from a ten-year overhaul that included firebox work undertaken at Israel Newton. At the time of writing the veteran is undergoing running-in.
In May, the peak of the celebratory season gets under way with four weekends of action that has been given the title of ‘Great North Festival of Railways’. The first two weekends of May will have a firm Victorian theme with 1863-built Furness Railway No. 20 as the headline guest. It’s also highly likely that at least one more Victorian steam locomotive will be joining the line-up for the month with negotiations under way. For now, the Steam Railway team are sworn to secrecy about what it might be.
It’s not all about the visiting locomotives in 2025. Tanfield has a fleet of six steam locomotives available for traffic at the moment. Twizell will be joined by Andrew Barclays Horden and Stanley, Hawthorn, Leslie 0 4 0ST Keighley Corporation Gas Department No. 2, plus Robert Stephenson and Hawthorns-built 0 4 0ST Sir Cecil A. Cochrane and National Coal Board ‘Austerity’ No. 49. If you add in the resident diesel fleet (all of which are locally relevant too) that figure rises to nine, so it’s clear to see that a good show is well within Tanfield’s capability.
Tanfield’s long-standing focal event for enthusiasts is the ‘Legends of Industry’ gala weekend. This year it’s a three-day event over June 20-22. Again, at least one visitor will be taking part with the focus for this event being on locomotives that were built, or worked, in the North East. Negotiations are well under way for a machine that hasn’t worked in the area for around 50 years. With the sizeable home fleet in action too, David is expecting it to be the biggest industrial railway event of the year. With at least seven steam locomotives expected to be in action it’s also looking set to be the biggest gala Tanfield has ever hosted.
In August, attention is likely to return to Causey Arch for a theatrically focused event designed to engage new audiences with early railway history. Such a dramatic location lends itself well to drama of a different kind, but David has other ideas too. “The plan we’re working on at the moment has got a bit of comedy, a bit of fun for families, but it’d educate a new audience.” Waggonway comedy is undoubtedly a new niche that has never before been tackled on the stage – but if ever there was a time to do it, this is it.
Not content, the railway will round off the year with another gala event over the weekend of October 18/19 … although the name, the ‘Gan Canny Gala,’ might need some explaining to those of us who aren’t native to the North East. ‘Gan Canny’ is a traditional alternative to saying goodbye and wishing someone a safe journey in the region. This slot is normally a ‘home fleet’ gala, but for 2025 there’s yet again a visit in the offing.
“Think early steam,” says David, although he very much sees this event, and indeed all of the events planned at Tanfield in 2025, as complementary and not competitive to the Stockton & Darlington events, and a great opportunity to increase understanding of how the evolution of railways took place.
“There are clearly still people out there who believe George Stephenson got up one morning, decided to build Locomotion and the Stockton & Darlington Railway, then suddenly railways were born. It clearly didn’t really happen like that.
“It’s a bit like suggesting the iPhone was the world’s first mobile phone. Railways are just the same – but with an even longer evolutionary period. I think Tanfield is best placed to help people understand,” says David.
A 300th legacy
Back in 2000, Tanfield celebrated its 275th anniversary with one visiting locomotive (North Eastern Railway ‘H’ class No. 1310 from the Middleton Railway) and a couple of the home fleet. Progress made in the intervening years is clear to see. But what comes after ‘Tanfield 300’?
“I very much see this as a legacy year,” says David. “Hopefully it will kick start a lot of projects. A priority is new buildings to get more stuff under cover. Plus a focus both on being more museum orientated and more business-minded at the same time.”
Preparatory and planning works are already under way for one of those buildings; a large two-road structure at Marley Hill that will become the railway’s seventh new building put up to house or maintain rolling stock since preservation, the majority of those completed since 2000. The railway has also completed a large amount of work to stabilise and preserve Marley Hill engine shed – including reinstalling smoke hoods that allow locomotives to be lit up inside the shed as they last were in pre-preservation days... creating a spectacle for visitors to the oldest working steam engine shed in the world.
Although largely unnoticed, the railways rolling stock collection has also changed in recent years with some vehicles leaving for restorations to be progressed, and others to find new and more appropriate homes entirely. Although the Tanfield Railway has always been focused on rolling stock relevant to the North East, it did collect a few stragglers on the way and there has been an acceptance that those vehicles that don’t score highly in their relevance will probably never reach the front of the queue for attention.
“We’ve been through a difficult time of reviewing stock,” David adds. “Some items have left, hopefully some new stuff will arrive that better meets our collections policy and that process will continue.
“With more undercover storage we’ll be able to make a lot more of the collection presentable and in time more accessible to visitors too. Our collection is second to none and has a host of amazing stories to tell. But at the moment we aren’t good enough at telling them. We have the skills, the knowledge and the passion to do that within the team at Tanfield, but we do need to focus on it a bit more.”
It would be easy to conclude that restoration work is in something of a lull, but that’s far from the case. In reality two of the biggest restoration projects ever undertaken at Tanfield are making great strides.
Currently in the locomotive workshop is Hudswell, Clarke ‘Cornist’ class 0 6 0T No. 38 (Works No. 1823 of 1949). Although built in Leeds, No. 38 was a North East machine for its entire career, starting out at Rising Sun Colliery in Wallsend. Despite a stalled restoration effort decades ago, No. 38 has never worked in preservation. At present, the volunteer workforce is close to completing the rolling chassis of No. 38 while work is also under way on the tanks and bunker. Meanwhile, boiler work has also been taking place. Volunteers at Marley Hill have removed the inner firebox and a new ‘blank’ is being made at Israel Newton, which it is planned to fit in-house at Marley Hill – a first for the line. Completion is still a couple of years off, but progress is strong
Just a few feet away, in the wood workshop, former North Eastern Railway luggage composite No. 456 is also steadily heading for completion. This 1890-built carriage was regarded as a basket case by many, having been cut clean in half when it was moved to a farm after withdrawal in 1915. But, again, an all-volunteer team have risen to the challenge of resurrecting No. 456 on a parcels van chassis.
The body was dismantled down to curb rail level and methodically rebuilt, section by section with new oak grafted in where required. At the time of writing the body is panelled, most of the doors have been refitted and attention is focused on beading. Although impossible to see from the outside, the central luggage compartment has also made it possible to adapt the carriage to provide an improved travelling experience for wheelchair users.
If No. 456 doesn’t make it into traffic in 2025, then North Eastern Railway saloon No. 1173 probably will. It’s an 1869-built four-wheeler, which appeared in The Railway Children. Stored for many years awaiting repairs, this unique vehicle is currently being fitted with a new headstock before being prepared for re-entering traffic. Once complete it will bolster Tanfield’s options for on-train catering and events, a very popular afternoon tea service already being a staple of the timetable. And if that isn’t enough, a further NER saloon intended for use at Tanfield – 1870-built No. 70 – is in the latter stages of restoration at Stanegate Restorations and Replicas in Haltwhistle. The waggon fleet isn’t being forgotten either with one of the railway’s Lambton Hetton and Joicey colliery hoppers currently in for assessment before hopefully being restored on-site.
“I remember saying a few years back that I wanted to help change Tanfield from being a ‘hidden gem’ to just being ‘a gem,’ David sums up. “Hopefully ‘Tanfield 300’ will play a big part in doing that.”
If the first few weeks of 2025 are anything to go by, we suspect Mr Watchman will go a long way towards doing just that!
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