‘The Stratford Upon Avon & Midland Junction Railway’ (or S.M.J.) was a small independent railway company which ran a line across the empty, untouched centre of England. It visited the counties of Northamptonshire, Warwickshire, Oxfordshire and a little of Buckinghamshire, only existing as the SMJ from 1909 to 1923. In 1923 the S.M.J.became a minor arm of the London Midland and Scottish (L.M.S.), then in 1948 'British Railways'
Gone but not forgotten: "the damsel is not dead, but sleepeth"
Broom History Group will be holding an event at Broom Village Hall 2-4pm on 9th November 2024 including a film on the railway and Broom Junction.…Continue
Hi everybodyI’m building a OO gauge model of Fenny Compton and Clifford Sidings over here in Belgium.Quite a strange idea but so be it…In view of this I plan to transform a RTR Beatie Well Tank into SMJR N° 5 the 2-4-0T and use some etchings for the…Continue
I believe that the kiln at Showsley is or rather was a calcine kiln, it resembles a brick kiln, but it was never used for calcining. It was used as a workmans mess room.
I came across a reference to the 'kiln' in one of the ES Tonks books.
I believe I had said previously that the 'kiln' was a brick kiln on another thread. I was wrong
The 'kiln' looks like a brick kiln but was going to be used as a calcining kiln for the ironstone. I assume had the building been used for calcining ironstone the stone would have been barrowed in.
I would have thought that it would have been a very smokey environment and not much stone would have calcined. I don't know what the dimesions of the building were. It is somewhat small.
I have had experience of working with calcining iron ore and it is a filthy horrible working environment.