Rother Valley Railway

Sorry Trevor. I didn't mean to queer your pitch!

 

Here’s the auctioneer’s blurb - “Low hours & mileage”
https://auctions.ramco.uk/past-auctions/ramco-11436

 

Essential works to the embanking North of Robertsbridge on the NR land, hosted at RVR.
https://rvrailway.blogspot.com/2025/07/gully-6-jul-25_24.html

 

Humm.. That looks interesting : Hours Run = 252 . Mileage 26287 (?) . Methinks they are missing a decimal point there otherwise it would have been running at an average of 104.3 MPH for every hour run. Not bad for a little 60 HP. (Eat your heart out Elon )
Even if the mileage readout should be 2628.7 (can't quite see any decimal point) that's still an average speed of over 10 MPH for every hour run. No time for standing still with this one . Interestingly the odometer at controls in the other end is reading 27?35. Each speedo range is +/- 30 MPH
I wanna come play....

 

Perhaps in its early days it was being used by Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and U.N.I.T.?
The odd tear in the space-tine continuum would do that sort of thing. (Showing my age, here)

 

Hours run could be since last engine rebuild?

 

I think hour meters don't work that well.

 

In my house we call them 'clocks' and they are pretty reliable.

 

Most construction plant and Farming Equipment have hour meters which are supposed to record the number of hours the equipment has operated. On older machines it is part of the Rev Counter and estimates of hours are based on revolutions.

 

2 new updates today, one about bridges 13, 15 and the imminent renumbering thereof, plus a short video of the Baguley-Drewry railcar running at Rolvenden (perhaps off to sort out those pesky Sea-Devils invading the Rother Levels?)
http://rvrailway.blogspot.com/?m=1

 

An interesting update on progress on the eastern end of the new line https://rvrailway.blogspot.com/

 

https://rvrailway.blogspot.com/2025/08/section-5-11-first-steps-on-section-5.html
This ones pretty significant in the reconstruction steps!

 

Some stunning drone shots, Trevor. Really shows how progress has ramped up over the last few months, and that the course of the line is now very clearly defined again, 50 years on.
Bridge 25 spans going in be pretty imminent, now?

 

Update on bridge 25 (not quite, but almost)!
http://rvrailway.blogspot.com/?m=1
Interesting the comments on the quality of the original abutments- were these originals, from 1900, or replacements done by the Italian PoWs?
(In which case, thats Roman concrete for you!)

 

This bridge was built in 1941 by Italian prisoners of war, part of those captured in large number by the British during the WW11 Western Desert campaign. They included a group of Italian army railway engineers who found their way to a prisoner of war camp established a short distance from Robertsbridge Station.

The story goes that soon after arriving at the prison camp they went to the camp commandant to explain that they were bored and wanted to put their skills to use. Get yourselves over the K&ESR and report to Mr Bill Austen (Jnr) was apparently how it all started.

Bill Austen (Jnr) was the railway's engineer and who was still with us in the early years of K&ESR preservation. A real gentleman I was privileged to get to know well and who became a good friend to me as a teenager living in Tonbridge just a short cycle ride from his house. The government paid the Italian railway engineers 1s 6d per hour, which I believe was set as about 2/3rd the normal rate for UK building labourers at the time - not bad really when they were being fed and housed as well. Bill was full of praise for them as nice hardworking people he was pleased to have on board in what they did all over K&ESR. One of his favorite stories was explaining how when a rather long train of wagons arrived from the SR full of spoil to widen the approach embankment to the new bridge, they jumped to it and in no time at all finished hand unloading the train, going back to Mr Bill with a done that sir what's the next job.

Many happy memories for me as a lad including regular visits to Bill's house and sitting in his living room talking K&ESR, not realising back then I was sat right next to what had been Colonel Stephens wonderful old roller top desk - that today is in the museum at Tenterden.

Mike Hart

 

What a marvellous anecdote, Mike, and one of those which gives the whole K&ESR story that 4th dimension. And a very human one, as well.

 

That’s a wonderful bit of oral history. Was Austen’s bridge named after Snr or Jnr I wonder?

 

I knew that Austins Bridge was rebuilt by Italian POW's but not about this bridge, what other structures were rebuilt on the line during this time, when you might have thought that not much would have been done, was the line upgraded to act as a diversion route between Headcorn, and Robertsbridge, in case wartime traffic increased to the point where the line would need to carry much heavier loads?

 

The line was fully relaid during the war, and used as a diversionary freight route, particularly at night, and on the build-up to Overlord. This work was presumably done at the behest of the Railway Executive Committee, which, it appears, had direct control of the KESR, rather than using the Southern Railway as its intermediary.
Its an interesting aside to note that the railways of this country were effectively under state control from September 1st 1939 right through until privatisation. Nationalisation was in a way just ratification of the arrangement!
Those wartime freights and military trains must have been quite something to see and hear, rumbling along the Rother Levels in the night.
And yes, I'd also love to know what else the Italians did along the line during those years