Railways of Liddesdale - Part 1 – Two early proposals

The opening of the Border Counties and Border Union Railways through Liddesdale in 1862 was the culmination of some 30 years of planning. The most important factor governing which railways were built through the south of Scotland was undoubtedly the need to connect Scotland’s main cities, Edinburgh and Glasgow, with England.

In the 1830s, long distance railways were a completely novel idea, and at first no-one had any idea how much traffic would develop. Perhaps there would only be enough traffic for one cross border line.[1] But, if so, what route could possibly serve Glasgow, Edinburgh, Carlisle and Newcastle adequately? In trying to answer this question, fourteen separate cross-border railways (plus a few minor variations) were proposed between 1833 and 1845 and a list of them, together with an account of how the railway network developed, can be found in CJA Robertson’s book The origins of the Scottish railway system 1722-1833 ( Edinburgh: John Donald, 1983 pp 270-272).[2]

Up to the 1830s, what railways existed were purely local lines, many concerned with transporting coal or industrial or agricultural products products (e.g. the Kilmarnock & Troon opened 1808, Edinburgh & Dalkeith opened 1832).[3] Towards the end of the 1830s, however, links began to be established between some of the principal Scottish towns so that by 1842 Edinburgh was connected to Glasgow by rail, and from there a line ran south west to Paisley, Kilmarnock and Ayr.[4] In the north of England, Newcastle & Carlisle opened in 1838[5] and the Maryport & Carlisle in 1845[6]. But as yet no railways ran north/south linking Scotland with England.

Of all the schemes detailed by Robertson, only two affected Liddesdale. Both were examples of central routes that attempted to serve both east and west coast.

One, promoted by the Newcastle & Carlisle Railway and by Newcastle Town Council in 1838, and revived in 1843, with John Blackmore as its engineer, would have linked Hexham and Edinburgh by way of Kielder, the Note o’ the Gate, Rule Water, Melrose, Galashiels and Edinburgh with a branch from Gala to Glasgow.[7] This route was examined closely, along with 7 other routes, in 1841 by the Smith-Barlow Commission.[8] It was a serious contender because its mileage between Newcastle and Edinburgh ( 115.95 miles) was slightly less than the East Coast route via Berwick ( 116.53 miles). But this was more than cancelled out by the two ranges of hills it had to cross and the cost of a long tunnel (5390 yards) under the Note o’ the Gate . The southern end of this route would eventually be built, as part of the Border Counties Railway, linking Hexham with Riccarton.


A second proposal in 1843 ( the 'Central Union'), again supported by the Newcastle & Carlisle Railway, would have branched off their line at Gilsland, run through Liddesdale to Hawick, Galashiels and Edinburgh.[9] The line would be 90 miles long with the aim of connecting ‘the metropolis with the capital of Scotland, by a central direction’. This plan did have some logic to it. Edinburgh and Glasgow are both west of Carlisle. Gilsland, 40 miles west of Newcastle, the furthest north point of the Newcastle & Carlisle line, and by sending a line off towards Scotland from there, the directors were hoping, not just to convey any Newcastle- Edinburgh –Glasgow traffic, but also to tap traffic coming north via the proposed Lancaster & Carlisle railway which was due for completion ‘within the present year’.[10] The promoters ‘claimed for their scheme the certainty of an advantageous route’ and ‘an ample return’ for their investors. But it also suffered from the problem of getting through and over the Border hills.

In the end, the Caledonian Railway’s Carlisle-Lockerbie-Carstairs-Edinburgh/Glasgow line was the first cross-Border line to open (1848), providing effective links from Edinburgh and Glasgow to the west coast of England, with a link to Newcastle via Hexham.[11] Completion of the Royal Border Bridge over the Tweed on 29 August 1850 meant that trains could run through from Edinburgh to Newcastle via the east coast line.[12] Two months later the Glasgow-Dumfries-Carlisle route opened. [13]

But by then there was a fourth railway with potential as a cross Border route: the North British Railway had reached Hawick from Edinburgh in October 1849.[14]

Andrew Bethune