
The last week of September saw the climax of our Rail 200 (200 years of the railways) celebrations. Thanks to our friends at St Barbe Museum and the other New Forest friends group for jointly planning and organising of these events.
A big thanks to Simon Hanney from the Swanage Railway for an excellent talk on the history of railways in the New Forest. Simon really brought the subject to life and took us all on a journey through the ages. There was a near capacity audience of 120 people in the Sway village hall.

A memorial plaque was unveiled to the men who lost their lives during the building of the railway through Sway in the 1880s. The “navvies” suffered severe hardships during the construction of our railway, particularly due to the collapse of the building contractor and also in having to stabalise Barton Clay (the “Treacle Mines”) to the west of Sway. The picture is of some of the navvies who worked up this line.
The Rail 200 events culminated with a service at St. Luke’s church in Sway in a celebration and commemoration of 200 years of the railways given by Richard Elliot.
A competition of young people’s art was held. Here are some of the entries.


