First Openings
The opening of the line was much delayed by difficulties which the contractor had not foreseen and which he had not sufficient capital to enable him to surmount.
The main line opened from St Leonard's to a coal pit at Craighall on 4 July 1831; this was probably close to the present-day Newcraighall.
It was soon extended to a temporary terminus at Dalhousie Mains, on the north bank of the South Esk river, opening in October 1831. The route ran via Millerhill village and Hardengreen, crossing the North Esk on a bridge 60 feet high, and the main line was about 10¾ miles long.
The Fisherrow branch from Niddry (later spelt Niddrie) opened on the same day; the junction at Niddry was facing for trains from St Leonards. Fisherrow had a small fishing harbour, and offered the possibility of transferring coal to coastal shipping. (Carter calls the point of divergence "Wanton Walls", and says that there was another branch from Cairney to Musselburgh collieries.
The main line was double track, and the branch was single. The gauge was 4 ft 6in, "which Grainger had established with his railways in the west". Horse haulage was used throughout, (except of course for the rope-worked incline plane).
At this early date there was no thought of passenger operation, and the locations on the line were not "stations". The terminus at Dalhousie Mains is referred to as "Eskbank" by one source, but that name was not applied until after takeover of the line by the North British Railway. Cobb calls the 1834 passenger station there "South Esk", but that may simply refer to "the station at the South Esk River".
There were numerous small coal pits on the line of route, and they were quick to construct their own tramway connections to the line; already in 1832 a contemporary account of a journey on the line described "the rich flat valley through which we now rolled, veined with rail-ways, branching off, right and left, to the several coal-works – to Edmonstone, Newton, "Sir John's", &c &c".
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