Leicester and Swannington Railway - Early Operation

Early Operation

The first part of the line opened on 17 July 1832 with a train hauled by Comet, driven by George Stephenson himself, with driver Weatherburn, from Leicester to the first Bagworth station at the foot of Bagworth incline. The locomotive's 13 feet (4 m) high chimney was knocked down by Glenfield Tunnel, due to the track having been packed up too high. It is said that the train stopped so that the passengers could wash themselves in the nearby Rothley Brook.

Difficulties remained with the cutting at Battleflat and the remainder of the line to Swannington did not open until 1833.

By the end of 1833 the line was delivering coal from Whitwick, Ibstock and Bagworth collieries far more cheaply than could be done from the Erewash Valley.

The expansion of the coal trade transformed the area, even giving rise to a new town at Long Lane - Coalville. George Stephenson himself settled at Ravenstone, near Ashby-de-la-Zouch and, with his son Robert, opened a colliery at Snibston in 1833. He was commemorated by the inclusion of the red fleur de lys in the arms of the former Ashby de la Zouch Rural District Council.

The usual train consisted of twenty-four wagons of 32 cwt each. The idea that there would be a demand from passengers came a something of a surprise to the directors, but a carriage was hastily built, and very soon the line was carrying about 60 passengers a day and their fares were repaying one per cent of the capital. In time, both first and second class was provided. On payment of the fare at the departure station, each passenger would receive a metal token marked with the destination. This would be given up on arrival and reused. Small four-wheeled wagons and coaches, painted plain blue, comprised the rolling stock.

For many years facilities for passengers remained primitive, with local inns and tiny cabins serving as booking offices and passenger carriages being attached to goods trains. There was no platform at West Bridge until a new passenger station was opened there in 1839 to handle the passenger trains that had been introduced six years earlier.

Glenfield tunnel was only the second tunnel in the World on a passenger railway, having shortly followed the opening of one on the Canterbury and Whitstable Railway. It proved an attraction for the inquisitive and had to be fitted with gates.

Meanwhile, devastated by the loss of their Leicester trade, the Erewash coalmasters met at the George Inn at Alfreton and decided to build their own line to Leicester, down the Erewash Valley from the Mansfield and Pinxton Railway, a tramway which had been built in 1819. Though not completed along its full length until much later, this was the beginning of the Midland Counties Railway, which in turn, became a founding partner in the Midland Railway.