A typical train from the latter days of the line
to Guildford, recreated here on the Bluebell Railway
A view of the extent of the old Horsham Railway
Yard
The station buildings at Warnham, a fairly classical design of
station building used extensively
 A
train in Horsham stations platform 4
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Horsham Railways - past
and present
The first railway line to
reach Horsham arrived on the 14th February 1848 and was a branch from the
Brighton main line at Three Bridges. The terminus of this, the Arun Valley
line, was at Horsham station for 11 years until the line to Petworth
opened to the south in 1859. Two years later this line was joined by a
line from Shoreham, which joined at Christ’s Hospital station (then
known as south Horsham), and another two years later by the only surviving
line south from Horsham, the line to Littlehampton and Portsmouth. A
further line to serve Horsham which is now closed was the line to
Guildford, opened 1864 and closed just over a century later in 1965, its
najor claim to fame being that during the 1960s it was used for the
filming of the original TV series of the book The
Railway Children at Cranleigh station.
The other major line from London to serve Horsham is the line from Sutton
and Dorking, the Mole Valley line. The extension to this line from Dorking
opened in 1863, the same year as the Portsmouth line. Horsham was now
developing into an important railway junction for the London, Brighton and
South Coast Railway, and provided a diversionary route for expresses to
the south coast. The goods yard opened in 1851 (as most railway stations
had a yard at this time), but soon grew into a large yard with a heavy
flow of traffic to London and the ports of Portsmouth, Littlehampton,
Shoreham and Southampton. In 1871 a roundhouse was opened to house and
maintain engines used over the routes around the town.
The initial passenger service consisted of through trains from London
routed via. Epsom and Dorking, a motor train (also known as “push-pull”)
service to Three Bridges calling at the intermediate stations opened in
1907 at Rusper Road Halt (Littlehaven today) and Lyons Crossing Halt (Ifield),
as well as the groing town of Crawley. In addition, there were regular
workings south over the multitude of lines to the south. Special workings
were common, as foreign dignitaries were bought up from Portsmouth by
train through Horsham to London. The Royal Train was also a regular
visitor.
The opening of Christ’s Hospital school to the south of Horsham in 1902
spurred traffic on the line as students and teachers travelled to the
school at the start and end of terms, as well as several special workings
for the school which lasted well into the 1960s. The station was renamed
after the school in the same year.
The lines from Three Bridges and Epsom were electrified as far as Horsham
in 1938, and continued on to Littlehampton later that year. Also during
the late 1930s the station was rebuilt from the classic design originally
built into a 1930s art deco style frontage. This has been voted the least
attractive building in Sussex on several occasions. The lines through the
station were also remodelled.
During the war the large railway yard and junction status for lines to the
coast made Horsham a major target for the Luftwaffe. The yard suffered
regular hits, although local history has it that one night the pilots of
some bombers missed Horsham and instead bombed the small village of
Colgate just outside the town. In 1940 a freight train ran into a bomb
crater just south of the town, although no-one was injured. Meanwhile, in
December 1942, a train from Horsham to Guildford was attacked by two
German fighter aircraft just outside Bramley. The train was full of
Christmas shoppers and 3 people were killed, two of them women with
Christmas shopping. Fortunately these were the only incidents of enemy
action directly affecting the railways around Horsham.
The town declined in railway importance in the 1960s as the Becching cuts
took place. The lines to Shoreham, Guildford and Midhurst were closed, and
much of the railway yard was sold off. Even the impressive shed was
demolished and is now buried beneath Horsham Industrial Estate. Despite
attempts to revive freight in the town, through a Fertiliser company among
others, the yard fell desolate for many years, although in 2006 Network
Rail started to base its modern track inspection vehicles in the yard.
In the 1980s the expresses to the coast were re-routed away from the
Dorking line to the Crawley line in order to serve Gatwick Airport. The
Dorking line is now very much the poor relation, with only one train an
hour taking an extra half an hour to reach Victoria compared with the
route via. Three Bridges. The service on the Three Bridges line is much
healthier, with two semi-fast trains calling only at Crawley before
reaching the Brighton line, and which also continue the other way towards
Chichester (1 train per hour) and Portsmouth Harbour / Bognor Regis (1
train per hour) splitting at Barnham. The other trains start and terminate
at Horsham and call at all stations to Three Bridges, and continue to
Tunbridge Wells (reversing at Redhill).
Chris Ward
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