Southern Railway Routes West of Salisbury - Securing Territory

Securing Territory

The London and South Western Railway (L&SWR) was formed from the London and Southampton Railway, one of the earliest long-distance lines, which opened from 1838. The first line was successful, and the company then extended its network, at first by building branch lines from the original main line, and then by building new lines. Securing territory, by building a route to "capture" an area quickly became an objective as a part of growing the company's business, and it was a natural consequence that this developed into a competitive battle with companies whose own territory lay adjacent.

This competition developed especially fiercely with the Great Western Railway GWR. This company had opened its main line from London to Bristol in 1838, and developed alliances that extended its influence to Exeter. Most of the railways being built at that time used the standard track gauge (the spacing between the rails) of 4 ft 8½in, but the GWR used a broad gauge of 7 ft 0¼in.

Often new railways in a locality were promoted by local interests, often wishing their line to be worked, or purchased, by one of the larger companies. Operation would be inconvenient if it were built to the gauge used by the rival, and the choice of gauge had to be made when seeking parliamentary authority for the construction. That choice implied—perhaps forced—alignment to one or other of the larger prospective parents. This led to the competition being characterised as the "gauge wars".

As the territory in the counties near London became saturated, thoughts of expansion turned to the relatively undeveloped west of England. The GWR and the Bristol and Exeter Railway working in partnership had formed a through route from London to Exeter in 1844, and with the South Devon Railway was to reach Plymouth in 1848; the three companies formed the powerful "broad gauge alliance".

The broad gauge route to Exeter ran via Bristol, leaving much territory as yet unsecured, and despite the agreement, the L&SWR determined to build a line to Exeter. But although it had reached Salisbury, this was a branch line from Bishopstoke (Eastleigh), and Exeter was 88 miles away.

The onward development forms the main content of this article.