Otford Station History

Otford STATION HISTORY

Compiled by David Asprey from notes by Ed Thompson with some help from “Otford in Kent – a History” by Dennis Clark and Anthony Stoyel – (Otford and District Historical Society 1975). Photographs from Ed Thompson Collection.

At last, at last!

The first train drew into Otford Station, on its present site, on 1^st August 1882. Although first-hand accounts of the event are singularly lacking, the stationmaster, Mr. Oliver, fresh from 15 years’ service at Dover, doubtless raised his tall hat in greeting while his family hung from the windows of Station House. Present, too, must have been the village schoolmaster, Richard Hoff; more than likely he would have brought his young charges with him to witness the development in which he had played so prominent a part.

Amid steam and engine whistles, the Otford Cinderella had at last come to the railway ball. For the previous twenty years the inhabitants of the village had experienced the daily frustration of seeing and hearing trains puffing past in each direction, without stopping. If Otfordians wished to travel by train, they first had to make their way by other means – usually on foot – to Shoreham or Bat and Ball, or later to Dunton Green on the South Eastern Railway line

The Sevenoaks Railway Company

A railway down the Darent Valley had first been mooted in 1858 to link Sevenoaks with the London Chatham and Dover Railway (LCDR) Company’s line then under construction to the north. Soon the Sevenoaks Railway Company (SRC) had been formed to construct a line, initially single track, from Sevenoaks Junction (later renamed Swanley Junction) to Sevenoaks (Bat & Ball), with intermediate stations at Eynsford and Shoreham. The Directors refused requests that a station at Otford be included in the plan.

It was thus that before 8:00 AM, on the 2nd of June 1862 the first of six daily trains in each direction passed through open country just to the east of Otford village, followed a few hours later by a special train carrying directors and officials on their way to opening day celebrations at Sevenoaks. Within little more than a year, the track had been doubled to meet expected traffic demand.

For the time being, Otford could merely watch the trains go by; the novelty, except perhaps for schoolchildren, doubtless soon wore off, though the passing of Royal trains may well have caused more excitement, when in June 1866 the Prince of Wales travelled to Bat & Ball on his way to Knole and in November 1867 Queen Victoria followed the same route.

Early in 1862 the SRC directors again turned down further pleas for a station at Otford. But even further frustration for the village was at hand……

All Change at Otford Junction

This is hardly the place to go into the moves and countermoves of Kent’s rival railway companies – the SRC (which changed its name to the Sevenoaks, Maidstone and Tonbridge Railway Company (SMTR) in 1862), the London Chatham and Dover Railway Company with whom it was linked at Swanley, and the South Eastern Railway (SER) then pressing to build a new main line to Tonbridge via Orpington and Sevenoaks.

An early proposal to build a line from Otford via Malling to Maidstone failed to gain parliamentary approval in 1862, but the branch was later agreed after complex negotiations leading to the possible fusion of the SMTR and the LCDR, and final agreement with the SER for a link to the station at Sevenoaks (Tubs Hill).

The Otford to Maidstone line met with initial technical and financial difficulties and did not open until 1874. Once again Otford was not accorded a station for local use, though one was constructed at Kemsing. At Otford Junction near Long Lodge, wooden platforms without any cover were erected to allow interchange between Sevenoaks and Maidstone trains. But there was no access from the village. Insult had now been added to injury. And so it continued for another eight years.

Mr Hoff to the rescue

Richard Hoff became headmaster of Otford’s National School in 1878 at the early age of 23 and held that post until his retirement 41 years later. He left his mark on many aspects of Otford village life, not only in education, but as organist, parish clerk, founder of the horticultural society, census enumerator; there seem few fields in which his dominating figure was not involved and it was not long before he turned his youthful energies to Otford’s lack of at railway station. Soon tired of having to walk to Shoreham if he wished to travel by train, he personally visited every house in the village seeking signatures to a petition which he took to Lord Amherst. His energy, perseverance and forceful lobbying proved successful and by early 1881 construction was well under way, Otford station being completed by the middle of 1882. After 20 years, Otford at last had its train service

For the time being, passengers were content. Otfordians could now travel to London in less than an hour at reasonable cost; the village acquired its first daily commuters to the capital and there followed an increase in housebuilding, mainly in the vicinity of the station. But relationships between the South Eastern and London Chatham and Dover railway companies were still poor, to the point at which in the mid-1880s, interchangeability of tickets had been withdrawn and services between the two stations at Sevenoaks ceased. Passengers now began to complain that the service had deteriorated and offered poor value for the fares they were asked to pay. A public meeting of protest took place in Sevenoaks in 1886; but the railway companies would not be persuaded to make changes.

The eventual merger of the two rival companies to form the South Eastern and Chatham management committee and the consequent rationalisation of routes and installations in 1899 did not immediately quell passenger dissatisfaction, despite the reinstatement of the facilities withdrawn more than 10 years earlier. Otford as an interchange station came in for more for particular criticism as offering little comfort to passengers kept waiting for connections there.

Salvation was, however, at hand and by the end of 1901 the Sevenoaks Chronicle was able to report:

“Now there is a moderately comfortable waiting room, lengthy covered platforms and a substantial rather handsome footbridge over the line for the accommodation of passengers who have to cross from one platform to the other. A siding for the local train is a great improvement and in many respects the station will compare favourably with those who which do service in places of greater importance than Otford.”

In addition to major improvements to their station, Otfordians could feel reasonably content with a service of 12 trains daily to London and no fewer than 16 trains on the local service to Sevenoaks Tubbs Hill.

Welcome Henry Willis

The upgrading of Otford station coincided with the arrival as station master of Henry Willis, who was to occupy that post for the next 15 years. An imposing figure in tail coat and waistcoat, both with braid edging, lent further gravitas by his flat peaked hat, gold braided on the brim and bearing the embroidered initials “SECR”, he saw many changes, like the arrival in 1909 of the famous “P” class locomotives which served travellers well for some 17 years on the Sevenoaks shuttle service and, two years later, the belated replacement of the station’s oil lamps by gas. The elegant, fluted columns with their decorated lamp tops (the words “Otford Junct.” inscribed on the glass) were to grace the station’s platforms until the 1930s.

Before his retirement in 1915 he had experienced the transfer of the railways from peacetime to war conditions. Even after leaving Otford he saw further service at the London headquarters of the railway. A lifelong Wesleyan Methodist, he continued his active support of the church in Otford, becoming a senior trustee in 1930 and in 1935, at the age of 86, he was accorded the honour of laying the foundation stone for the new church building. He died the following year.

In War and Peace

Strict government control during the wartime period ensured that passenger services, other than for essential troop movements were reduced in priority. In consequence, the shuttle service between Otford and Sevenoaks Tubbs Hill was suspended, and Bat & Ball station closed, until early 1919.

With the end of hostilities train passengers were again considered of major importance, and in the face of severe competition from tramways in the London area, the railway management planned a programme to replace steam with electric traction. The two routes from London to Sevenoaks via Orpington and via Swanley were chosen to pioneer this upgrading, but the ever-present shortage of capital meant that another 16 years were to elapse before the third rail came to Otford

During that time, the ownership and operation of Britain’s railways was further concentrated; under the Railways Act of 1921 they were merged into four groups. One of these was the Southern Railway, formed from five constant constituent companies including the South Eastern and Chatham railway, itself the result of the earlier merger of 1899.

Although electric trains to Orpington came into service in 1925, almost another ten years were to pass before passengers were able to travel by “Southern Electric” to Sevenoaks using either route from London. In 1930 the station name had been shortened to just “Otford” instead of “Otford Junction”.

The coming of electrification dramatically improved services between Otford and London, as well as to Sevenoaks, and housing developers lost no time in promoting their building schemes in the village, increasing its population by perhaps 50% by the outbreak of World War Two in 1939…. the year in which electrification was extended from Otford to Maidstone, but strangely, it was not until 1969 that electricity replaced gas as a means of station illumination.

War and Demise

The coming of war put into cold storage all plans to extend the electrified lines to the Kent coast and for the years that followed the Southern Railway, battered by enemy action and suffering from lack of maintenance and many of its skilled staff, bore the brunt of movements of troops, material and evacuees whilst maintaining regular services as best it could.

Peace soon brought further upheaval. Nationalisation of the railways on 1st January 1948 led in turn to the modernisation plan of 1955. The heyday of the railways was over; from now on it was a rear-guard battle against the growing might of road transport. Steam trains were seen for the last time. Goods facilities at Oxford were withdrawn in 1962 and the sidings removed making way for a much-needed car park.

All through the 1970s and 1980s changes had been made to the face of Otford station. The signal box was first to disappear in 1970. The goods shed went in 1972. A year later a new road bridge was completed over the railway at the northern end of the platforms and in 1974 the M26 road bridge appeared at the junction, where in due course that signal box was demolished. The footbridge, described as “rather handsome” in 1901, was apparently showing its age and was replaced in 1982 by the present structure in a different position. The exit gate on the down platform was closed. Next to go was the waiting room and canopy on that platform in 1985.

The Otford station of today bears only basic resemblance to the one which received such a welcome in 1882, or even to the extended version of 1901. Streamlined “bus shelters” and bright colours are the order of the day; garishly painted trains and others carrying strange Pantographs on their roofs draw in, and depart, almost silently.

What would Mr Oliver, or Henry Willis make of it all? And is this the shade of Richard Hoff standing there, sideburns bristling, leaning a little on his cane and jangling in his pocket the little bag of sovereigns he used to carry to tame recalcitrant pupils? And, no doubt, smiling. But at least the trains do stop and not pass Otford by!