Railway bridges and viaducts of Cheshire

People keep visiting this blog from all over the world. We've had hits from Iran and Russia, and even someone from France visited once. But what are they looking for? The Red Badger thinks they probably want information about Railway Viaducts in Cheshire for today's special feature.

Cheshire? But everybody thinks it is flat! Well it clearly isn't because it has the following:

Dutton Viaduct over the River Weaver, near Acton Bridge. The Red Badger took this photo. The viaduct cost £54,440 to build and 700,000 cubic feet of stone was used. That is a lot of stone.

The North Rode Viaduct over the River Dane, near Bosley. Apparently this contains 1,000,000 bricks and 400,000 cubic feet of stone, and cost £54,000 to construct. This photo is by Rodger Kidd on Geograph.

The Tremlow Viaduct crosses the River Dane near Holmes Chapel. This photo is by irwingcomand.

The Sutton Weaver Viaduct in Frodsham. This photo is from the Travels of Steve & Bridie on Blogspot, which documents life in a narrow boat.

Did you know that there was once a terrible accident on the railway line between Frodsham and Warrington?

When the line opened in 1850, thousands of people took the opportunity to visit Chester Cup day at the race course. One steam train had to pull 50 carriages! After the races, over 5,000 people packed in to Chester station to catch the train back to Manchester. One locomotive called "Druid" pulled 18 carriages packed with 900. At Frodsham, it had to stop to let some people get off. It slipped on wet rails and made slow progress over the Sutton Weaver viaduct before coming to a halt at the entrance to the 2km long Sutton Tunnel, which is at the northern end of the viaduct.


By this time, a second locomotive, called Number 16, had set off from Chester, carrying another 430 people. Thankfully, Druid's guard managed to get Number 16 to stop in time, and the two trains coupled together and pushed on. But Number 16's wheels also began to slip, and both trains carrying over 1,300 passengers came to a halt half way through the tunnel. Not good!

By now the next train, pulled by an engine called Albert, had arrived in Frodsham station. This was 14 minutes after No. 16's train had left and 24 minutes after Druid's train. Albert raced over the viaduct and entered the tunnel at high speed. Albert's driver, William Dixon noticed a lot of steam in the tunnel, but just thought this was because of all the special trains running back from Chester, and he pushed on, knowing that there were more trains behind.

You can guess what happened next, and it wasn't pretty. Albert ploughed in to the stranded trains. Several carriages were destroyed. Albert was derailed. The entire tunnel was filled with debris. 1,600 people were trapped in the perfect darkness, and in the distance, they could hear the sound of another train racing over the Sutton Weaver viaduct heading straight for the chaos. Thankfully that train stopped just in time, but five were dead. Four more people died later, and many more were seriously injured.

You can read all about it in this very old report and on this very green page.