Superb video. In all honesty we desperately need this railway from Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst reopened. Another 400 houses to be built in Hawkhurst and the roads are already saturated. Many thanks for this video.

Worked this branch as a fireman on loan from Hither green loco. Also Headcorn and Westerham Branches finishing my days as a driver at Brick layers arms this i did enjoy.

What you have filmed is not only fantastic! Shows a whole way of life now long gone.

How come 8 people don't like this wonderful film ? Ignoramus maximus x 8.

My late father easily spotted on the last days of both the Hawkhurst and Goudhurst lines worked often at Paddock Wood from his signal relief base at Cuxton and he used to keep in his head the old Hawkhurst timings even though the line had long gone. He did that for most of his life thereafter and could at a drop of a hat chuck out the train code, times etc for most the boxes he worked whether North Kent East Junc, Sittingbourne, Sheppey line, the only two boxes he never worked at was Meopham power and Dartford power and I remember all the little boxes displaced by those two boxes as I remember Orpington A as a kiddie and I even got to see inside the Orpington nuclear bunker.

Thank you for sharing these lovely Films, makes you realise how much we've lost, all the Work of those who cut the Railways, those who maintained them and worked them over the Years, all thrown on the scrap Heap, what a terrible waste.

I travelled on the line throughout the 1950's to go hop picking at Finchcox Farm. We'd started at Burgess Hill on the Btighton line, change at Three Bridges, East Grinstead, Tunbridge Wells, Tonbridge and Paddock Wood. It used to take all day to make a journey you could drive in 50 minutes. It would be impossible today post-Beeching. Meals cooked over a fire in the cookhouse, sleeping on straw in a hut with a corrugated roof, deafening when it rained. You'd pick from 8.00 am and the farmer would bring a horse-drawn wagon to weigh and take yout hops to the oast for drying, the most evocative smell there is.

Thanks for Sharing, my great uncle, was a fireman and driver out of tonbridge from the age of 14 until retirement. I saw his engine but not him.

Thanks for uploading this. I used to live in Paddock Wood when I was a kid in the 1980's. Back then the branch line was long gone but we'd play out in the old hop fields & one day we went out a little further & found the old branch line track bed. We followed it under a nearby bridge & as far as the old level crossing at Willow Lane between Paddock Wood & Horsmonden. Ever since then I've wondered sometimes about how the line looked when it was operating so this was fascinating to me

That would make a great heritage line.Pity it never got to Tenterden.

Many thanks for a superb video post....as one of an old hop picking family this film resonates...

1958 is like another world, today

An absolute gem of a film; I hope a copy is kept in the Kent County Archive. Thank you so very much for putting this film into the public domain. A1.

we had so much yet we thew it all away. we don't know it's gone till its gone,

I travelled daily by bus between Hawkhurst and Cranbrook for school in 1969-71. Although the line was long closed, the signal box at Hawkhurst and the tall station building at Cranbrook were still extant

Brilliantly researched and presented - thanks! As a train-obsessed child growing up in Horsmonden in the early 1980's, what I would have given for this lovely little line to have still existed.

Interesting to see that at 6.53 the signal at Hawkhurst seems to be in the car park! As always, a fascinating film.

This is brilliant stuff, so atmospheric. Thank you for sharing.

Makes me appreciate the Osmo Action and Rock Steady! No IBIS in those days I'm afraid!

At 4.09 the train passes under "Finchcocks Bridge " , which luckily has survived and is is now a listed building . The bridge was only wide enough for a single track . Therefore , a siding , which ran parallel to the main track ended just short of the bridge . On the return journey , at 8.47 , one can briefly see the siding at the left . I used to live and work at Finchcocks from 1973 onwards , by which time , everything had been lifted several years ago , but the course of the track could still be clearly seen as a distinct line in the countryside .

Wonderful Video, thanks for bringing it to us.

Brilliant nostalgia, thanks!

There should have been film footage taken of ALL branch lines that were closed.

HI im proud to say my DEAR old Dad was part of all this im 67 now' WE COME from the City as was generations of all the family'' Central LONDON SW.. DAD was a Driver for 36 years on lots of Class of Trains ,,HIS main Station was VICTORIA we lived in BATTERSEA stewarts rd near the old DECCA record company sidings Stewarts Lane &NINE ELMS not far from Battersea park.. 'growing up i STILL CAN see my Dad Going out spotless IN HIS overalls and cap , AND coming home with the SMELL of the graft on all those Journeys he done that day .. Those Spotless overalls FILTHY , poor old mum had to do her bit for B,R as well With the Washing,, HE DONE Regular Journeys to ROYAL TUNBRIDGE WELLS..route ,not to mention the BLITZ IN 1940S London he WAS A FIREMAN on troop carrier trains also , BUT i must admit he;d take me over the railway shed SIDINGS in Stewarts lane ALL THOSE Trains USED TO REALLY SCARE ME LIKE STEAMING DRAGONS I DIDN'T LIKE Going on the footplate of Trains ... LOVE TO DAD AND MUM

Please REVIVE this line!

Superb movie. Like your other films, not just excellent footage, but informative commentary also. I particularly enjoyed the explanation of how the driver in the driving trailer controlled the braking while the fireman on the footplate opened and closed the regulator on the driver's instructions by bell signal. In the late fifties and early sixties, indeed the seventies also, cine film was very expensive, even for a mere five minutes. Therefore I appreciate the commitment of making the film initially and more recently, digitising it. Well done and thank you both.

Interesting that even when an operational line, the track in many places is almost completely enshrouded in trees and bushes!

Is there any more good quality film such as this of the Hawkhurst to Paddock Wood line? The Hawkhurst to Paddock Wood line was the line that should have been saved for preservation in preference to the KESR. Look how many commuters travel from Hawkhurst, Cranbrook, Goudhurst and Horsmonden to London these days and have to drive over to Staplehurst etc. to catch a train. 1950s Hawkhurst had the railway and the Maidstone and District Bus Station yet today Hawkhurst has nothing worth mentioning being isolated with an abysmal lack of decent transport connections.

Whispering poplars This poem was sparked by a walk in 2018 near the site of Churn Siding on the Hawkhurst Branch railway which closed in 1961. In the summer of 1962 as the line was being lifted I walked along the rusting tracks and at one point was struck by the sound of the breeze rippling through some mature poplar trees. From the 1960s traditional hop growing in Kent also went into steep decline.A poplar tree is not long lived but these trees outlived that railway which was only there for about 70 years Whispering poplars Whispering poplars Saplings so small Your girth will expand Your height become tall. Bark will whiten and trunk will harden, Shelter provide for new hop garden. Whispering poplars swarthy navvies view, Who curse and dig and boil up stew On open fires in makeshift camps Walk nightly to inns by flickering lamps. Whispering poplars now in their prime Trains chug gently along the line Autumn brings hoppers from the smoke To live in huts and pick for the poke. Whispering poplars now past their best, Leaves never still, Never at rest The railway’s gone the hoppers too Landscape is hushed Just the breeze and you.

Think I've got the song formatted properly now! I'll try and find a video of a performance of it to link as well. Bob takes a lot of care that his "historic" songs of Kent and Sussex are authentic. I think he interviewed a couple of the drivers from this line to get inspiration for this one.Do you know Bob Kenward's song "Old Country Train"? It's about this line: Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden Pulling through the hopyards,pushing back again Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train Driver up the car end, sitting at his ease Fireman on the engine, doing as he please By Wealden woods and orchards, all the seasons through We worked the line by pull-and-push on duty 312. We’d a Chatham tank from Tonbridge, 17-0-4 And a two-set off the Brighton line,seen better years before Never had a guard, just a crate or two of fruit And a couple-or-three passengers all in their market suits: Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden Pulling through the hopyards,pushing back again Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train September brought the hoppers, we watched them all go past Coppertops and Converts, working fit to bust Hammering through Goudhurst,charging Badger’s Oak With the roughest of the old stock they could find up in the Smoke: Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden Pulling through the hopyards,pushing back again Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train I’ve taken out a Crompton from the yard at Hither Green Come home off the Dover run,my working clothes all clean But give me back the rails and that old Chatham tank I’d be back on steam tomorrow, charging Cranbrook bank: Paddock Wood to Hawkhurst by way of Horsmonden Pulling through the hopyards, pushing back again Ramblers for Cranbrook, wagons for Churn Lane We’ll never see the like of the Old Country Train I sing it at open mics and folk clubs sometimes and it always goes down well, especially locally in Kent.

What a gem of footage I've never seen before. The tall building opposite Paddock Wood station is the old Scats building. I never knew what they did there but I walked around it shortly before it was demolished.

The footbridge at Paddock Wood station is sadly no more, due to corporate vandalism of what should have been a listed structure. It was erected circa 1840 when the station was built. It has been replaced with a gaudy looking twin towered structure of an inapropriate looking design that is not in keeping with the look of the Victorian Station itself.

@AlanSnowdon Would it be possible to incorporate your remarkable footage into a film I'm making about this branch?

Reopen the lines i say! Kent was ruined by modernisation....The world's on a one way ticket to oblivion anyway!

great stuff

Grent

Hello Alan - I hope you have already but you do realise that these films should be lodged with the National Railway Museum? They're a wonderful record, not only of the trains and railways but the local scenery of that time - and they're in colour. They should be stored and preserved, no question about it. If you haven't already, I do hope you consider it. Thanks.

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