South Hants Model Railway Club

"Hemlock Down" by John Worsley

EM Gauge (18.2 mm) 4mm / 1 ft Scale

The History The opening of I K Brunels broad gauge Bristol and Exeter Railway between Taunton and Exeter on Wednesday 1 May 1844 was barely noticed by the people in the southern valley villages of Devons Blackdown Hills.  A few, that on special occasions, travelled to the market town of Cullompton stood in awe and wonder watching the mighty steam trains that came from strange and foreign parts.  However by the late 1860's the land owners in upper Culm and Sheldon valleys were beginning to wish for better communication with the markets, not only Cullompton but also Taunton, Tiverton and Exeter and thus the rest of England.

With the incorporation of the Culm Valley Light Railway Sir John Worsley of Rull House, Gipsy Cross, proposed the Uffculme and Sheldon Valley Light Railway to serve the Sheldon valley.  Although he claimed it was in his and his neighbours agricultural interest many saw the hand of his lovely young wife, Lady Joan, behind this, for besides being an attractive and very striking woman she had a very keen mind and could see far greater uses for the railway beyond farming needs.  Indeed Lady Joans mother, the grand dame of Taunton, Mary Garbutt, had been a keen investor in the early railways, seeing them as a way to drag the county into the 19th century and increase its prosperity by opening the English markets to Devonshire's products.  Alas her licentious son, Ian Garbutt only saw them as a way to squander his inheritance in the fleshpots of Bristol and London. The line of the U & SVL Rwy was to leave the Culm Valley line at Uffculme, turn south via Craddock, Ashill and Gipsy Cross to terminate after five and a half miles at Hemlock Down.  This small terminus was in the valley bottom alongside the river serving not only the village of Sheldon on the hill top to the south west but also Slade and Northcott, with Dunkeswell over the head of the valley.  Gipsy Cross station not only served Sir John and Lady Joan's house to the north but also the largest village on the line, Bodmiscombe, a half mile to the south, much of which along with the surrounding countryside was owned by Sir John's parents, the regal Lady Josephine and the redoubtable Sir Fredrick Worsley.

To save cost the line was built to the then narrow gauge of 4' 8½"  and opened at the same time as the Culm Valley Light Railway on 29 May 1876, it was worked from the outset by the Great Western Railway which had just absorbed the Bristol & Exeter Railway. The Uffculme & Sheldon did own some rolling stock, a couple of four wheel coaches, cattle and sheep wagons, horse boxes and a Directors Saloon, very grand for-such a  line. Both the Sheldon and the Culm valley lines were bought by the G.W.R. in 1880.  After just four years of existence the Uffculme and Sheldon Valley Light Railway became the Hemlock branch. Various locomotives have-been used on the line, at first B & E 0-6-0 tanks and later G.W.R. 2-4-0 and 0-4-2 tanks, but because of its remoteness and light traffic pattern this bucolic line became the repository of several old and quaint locomotives, usually with matching passenger stock. The line has always been predominately agricultural, sheep, cattle and pigs but especially milk and cream for markets not only in Devon but all over the realm, carried swiftly by the Great Western Railway. More unusual traffic is the transporting of the Tiverton Hunt of which Sir John and his descendants have been the masters, their much prized Red Devon bulls are also frequent travellers to the County Shows and the calls of duty.

The real feature of this layout lies below the track bed rather than above, in the construction of the baseboards themselves. These are built entirely from 3mm and 6mm birch ply, using a cellular box construction. Three longitudinal beams, 6" deep support a series of profiled cross-members set at 6" intervals.  Squareness is provided by means of 3mm panels let into the bottom of each cell, with the box being structurally closed by the trackbed, which sits on top of the cross-members.  All the joints are glued, fillet pieces being used throughout to effect the connections and avoid the need for precision fitting of the joints. Further weight was saved by skeletonising the various parts as much as possible. The result is a structure which is more reminiscent of the innards of an aeroplane wing, and which is light enough to be easily picked up yet at least as stiff as a more traditional framed, flat-topped baseboard of significantly greater weight. Above the track bed the layout is quite conventional, the track being made using either Ratio bases or, for the pointwork, ply sleepers and rivets. The points are operated from below, using drop pins attached to the blades engaging in a slider below the track base, using the principles of the unit once developed by Studiolith.

Track Plan

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Last updated: 05 June, 2006

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