Plymouth and Dartmoor Railway - Lee Moor Tramway

Lee Moor Tramway

The heavy mineral commodity being extracted by Lord Morley on Lee Moor required a means of transport to market, and the South Devon and Tavistock Railway was being promoted as a feeder to the South Devon Railway Company. It found an ally in Lord Morley in getting sanction for its line to Tavistock, by undertaking to build a branch line to Lee Moor. This involved the SD&T company taking over much of the Plymouth & Dartmoor Tramway system and converting it to broad gauge, which its alliance to the South Devon company required, but the Lee Moor line was to remain at the 4 ft 6in gauge.

A new line from Marsh Mills to Lee Moor was opened in 1856, in part to replace the old Plympton branch of the Plymouth & Dartmoor Railway. Two inclines were worked by stationary engines. The lower one, at Cann Wood, was worked by the descending wagons hauling up the ones travelling in the opposite direction, while the upper incline, at Torreycombe, was provided with water tanks that could be used to counterbalance heavy wagons being taken up the slope. The tramway crossed the Tavistock line on a level crossing near Marsh Mills and trains then continued to Plymouth along the old Cann Quarry line and original Plymouth and Dartmoor track. This entailed another level crossing of the South Devon main line between the Embankment Road and Laira engine sheds.

Lines ran from Lee Moor to both Wotter and Cholwich Town but these closed in 1900 and 1910 respectively. In the 1940s road transport took over most of the traffic and a pipeline was laid from Lee Moor to Marsh Mills in 1947 to carry china clay in slurry form, thus depriving the tramway of most of its purpose. A very limited traffic was carried until 1961 to maintain the tramway’s rights of way.