GWR Route: Moreton-in-Marsh to Shipston-on-Stour

Moreton-in-Marsh Station: gwrmm989

Moreton-in-Marsh station, station staff, shunting horse and the Permanent Way gang and the branch train standing in the background circa 1890. Shunting horses offered railway companies a flexible and cost-effective way of handling wagons in goods yards and were a common sight across the country. Similarly wicker baskets, as seen on the platform, were used by Victorians as early forms of containers in transporting everything from linen, clothing to pigeons. The baskets appear to have the initials G + P + O on their sides and therefore might be being used for parcel traffic. Today the term 'parcel traffic' conjures up the image of items wrapped in brown paper whereas in railway parlance parcel traffic was anything that could be safely handled and sent by passenger train.

back