South Staffordshire Railway

The South Staffordshire Railway was the railway company responsible for building several lines in and around the area of Staffordshire, England.

The Chief Engineer was John Robinson McClean. After an Act of Parliament was passed to allow it, he took a 25-year lease on the railway, thus becoming the first person ever to be the sole owner of a railway.^[1]

The pride of their company was the South Staffordshire Line from Lichfield Trent Valley to Dudley via Walsall. This line also connected with the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway's line from Wolverhampton to Stourbridge Junction and beyond - which allowed the company to run their trains to the south-east of the Black Country and into Worcestershire.

The company was taken over by the London and North Western Railway, which later became part of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway during grouping in 1923.

A (known) list of lines created by the SSR are below:

South Staffordshire Line
Walsall-Cannock Branch.
Extension to Bescot from Walsall to reach Birmingham.
The Darlaston Loop.
A branch to the coalfields near Brownhills.

References and Notes

↑ In Furness Past and Present, Barrow-in-Furness: Joseph Richardson (1870), p. 227, a memo by R. Smiles about John Brogden states that Brogden shared this lease with McClean

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