Fighting Cocks railway station

Fighting Cocks railway station was a railway station on the original route of the Stockton & Darlington Railway (S&DR), which served the villages of Middleton St George and Low Dinsdale in County Durham, as well as the once popular Dinsdale Spa Hotel from 1829.

Fighting Cocks
An engraving of Fighting Cocks station, from "The Railway Jubilee at Darlington" in Illustrated London News: 340, 2 October 1875
General information
LocationMiddleton St George, Darlington
England
Coordinates 54.5218°N 1.4724°W / 54.5218; -1.4724
Platforms2
Other information
StatusDisused
History
Original companyStockton & Darlington Railway
Pre-groupingNorth Eastern Railway
Post-grouping
Key dates
10 October 1825First regular passenger train over Stockton & Darlington Railway; first unofficial use of the station
c. 1830Official station opened as Middleton and Dinsdale
1866Renamed Fighting Cocks
1 July 1887Station closed to passengers
1964Station closed completely
Location
Fighting Cocks railway station is located in England
Fighting Cocks railway station
Fighting Cocks railway station
Location in England
Fighting Cocks railway station is located in the United Kingdom
Fighting Cocks railway station
Fighting Cocks railway station
Location in the United Kingdom
Fighting Cocks railway station is located in Europe
Fighting Cocks railway station
Fighting Cocks railway station
Location in Europe

History
The Fighting Cocks public house in November 2005 seen from the site of the level crossing. The station was located immediately to the left of the road.

When the Stockton & Darlington Railway first opened on 10 October 1825, there were no official stations, as passenger trains were provided by independent coach operators who purchased a licence from the railway company to enable them to operate on the line.[1] Tickets were sold by local publicans, and so it has been claimed that the Fighting Cocks public house, a coaching inn near where the railway crossed Rykeneild Street, could be one of the oldest surviving station booking office in the world.[2] It was not until the success of passenger services on the Liverpool & Manchester Railway persuaded[3] the S&DR to purchase the coach operators that in December 1833 it began to operate its own locomotive-hauled passenger service.[1]

In 1829, the Dinsdale Spa Hotel was opened close to the village of Low Dinsdale, which led to an increase in travel to the village using the railway. As a result, a permanent station was opened during the 1830s (appearing in timetables by 1838), on the east side of the level crossing, to cater for this traffic. It was originally called Middleton and Dinsdale but was renamed Fighting Cocks in 1866.[2]

In 1863 the S&DR was amalgamated into the North Eastern Railway (NER),[4] who on 1 July 1887 opened a new line from south of Darlington Bank Top station to Oak Tree Junction, east of Fighting Cocks station,[5] to enable passenger services on the former S&DR route to serve Bank Top station.[3] However the opening of this new route meant that Fighting Cocks was bypassed, and so a new station was provided at Dinsdale to replace it. Over the course of its life as a passenger station, approximately 30,000 passenger tickets were sold to Fighting Cocks. From this point on Fighting Cocks was only served by goods trains until it was closed completely as an economy measure in 1964.[2]

The line through the station remained as a through line until it was severed at the western end on 21 May 1967,[3] though it was partially retained as a short branch line from Oak Tree Junction until the 1970s.[2]

A public footpath now runs along the alignment of the railway through the site of the station.[6]

References
  1. Tomlinson, William Weaver (1914). The North Eastern Railway: Its Rise and Development. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Andrew Reid & Co Ltd. pp. 122–127 & 384–385. ISBN 9781296562458.
  2. "Making an unremarkable wall truly remarkable | The Northern Echo". The Northern Echo. Retrieved 19 December 2017.
  3. Hoole, K. (1973). Forgotten Railways: North-East England. Newton Abbot: David & Charles Limited. pp. 142 &151–152. ISBN 0715358944.
  4. Hill, Norman (2001). Teesside Railways A View From The Past. Hersham: Ian Allan Publishing Ltd. p. 42. ISBN 0711028036.
  5. Body, Geoffrey (1989). PSL Field Guides - Railways of the Eastern Region Volume 2. Wellingborough: Patrick Stephens Limited. p. 56. ISBN 1852600721.
  6. "SDR Booklet 6 Darlington to Goosepool via Fighting Cocks 2016-08-03.pdf" (PDF). Friends of the Stockton and Darlington Railway. Retrieved 29 December 2017.
Preceding station Historical railways Following station
Yarm
Line and station closed		   Stockton & Darlington Railway   Darlington North Road
Line closed; station open
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