150th birthday of the Bishop's Castle Railway

The Ludlow & Tenbury Wells Advertiser reports on the marking on the 150th anniversary of the opening of the Bishop's Castle Railway:

Bishop's Castle Railway Society marked the anniversary by erecting two commemorative plaques at each end of the route. One was placed near the site of the station in Bishop's Castle and the other at Craven Arms station from where trains to Bishop's Castle departed.

The Bishop's Castle Railway Society website points us to a description of the celebrations in the town when the line opened:

On the arrival of the train at Bishop’s Castle, the Shrewsbury sax-horn band struck up “See the Conquering Hero Comes”, and a procession headed by the band was formed consisting of the committee, shareholders, schoolchildren, with the workmen and public following in the rear. The town was decorated in various places with triumphal arches in evergreen, flags, banners and mottoes. Guns were fired throughout the day and bells rung ...

The Rev. W. Rowland, Rector of the parish, replying to the loyal toasts given by the Chairman said he had been in that locality 24 years, and no day had dawned upon him so happily as the day on which they were now assembled. He stood there as a clergyman, and he believed that the extension of railways was the means, under God’s blessing, of raising our country higher and higher. The Glee “Hail, Smiling Morn” then followed.

Sadly, these high hopes were not fulfilled. The line went into receivership two years later and remained there, celebrated for its rickety nature, until it closed in 1935.