LMS Route: The Shakespeare Route

Warwick Road

Contemporary reports of Warwick Road station, apparently situated at the point where the main Banbury to Warwick Road (later the A41) crossed above the E&WJR route, are notable by their absence, and as with North End, the station does not appear in any official E&WJR or local newspaper timetables. However, a first reference is found in Bradshaw's timetable for December 1871, but then only as a footnote stating that 'All trains between 7 morn. and 6 aft. stop by signal at Warwick Road'. After July 1872 Warwick Road is listed in the usual format in Bradshaw's together with North End, as a station between Fenny Compton and Kineton, but no train times are shown and a letter 'A' merely indicates a footnote which states 'Stops by signal'. Warwick Road then disappears from that timetable after June 1873, but unlike North End, it does not reappear. The entries in Bradshaw's timetables do indeed provide conclusive evidence of the existence of a station named Warwick Road, and as it is shown together with North End, this rules out any suggestion that the two might have been one and the same. However, the complete lack of any other contemporary record for Warwick Road similar to those found for North End (below) is puzzling.

Barry Taylor

Barry is also the author of 'The Stratford-upon-Avon & Midland Junction Railway - Volume 1 – The years before the S&MJR – 1866 to 1909 – The Constituent Companies' published by Black Dwarf Lightmoor, Witney, Oxfordshire.