The East Kent Railway was one of Britain's less well known light
railways, a part of the Colonel Stephens group of lines, the East Kent
Railway was meant to open up the newly discovered Kent coal field and
help to make its shareholders wealthy, however things took a different
turn, when the projected colliery's along the line did not materialise
the way the promoters had first envisaged.
The only colliery to produce quantities of coal being Tilmanstone near
Shepherdswell, which opened in 1912.
There were other pits started along the formation of the line from
Shepherdswell to Wingham, but in the cases of the other pits, only the
surface buildings or test shafts were constructed, before the work was
abandoned.
This was largely due to flooding and the poor calorific quality of East
Kent coal, which had to be mixed with other coal to be effectively
used.
There were four colliery's completed in Kent, the East Kent Railway only
served one of them and this together with the other three lasted until
the latter part of the 20th century.
The railway operated a loss making passenger service to Wingham and for
a few years to Sandwich Road halt on the line to Richborough Port line,
however the service to Wingham Canterbury Road came to an end in October
1948, after British Railways had taken control.
The East Kent Railway lasted through two world wars and was nationalised
in 1948, becoming part of the Southern Region of British Railways, it
closed to traffic in 1984, during the coal strike.
