Passengers rode the local service – which was fated for the famed Beeching cuts – for the final time in 1966

Most people know the Nene Valley Railway (NVR) as a heritage railway, home to evocative steam locomotives, ‘Thomas’, and a supporting cast of mighty Deltics and diesel engines.

What many people do not tend to know, however, is that the NVR was once part of busy passenger service line which originally opened in 1847, when the London and Birmingham Railway (L&BR) built a line from Blisworth in Northamptonshire to Peterborough.

While the line was initially of little importance, the construction of a secondary line (via Nassington and King's Cliffe to Seaton) turned Wansford – a previously unimportant village station – into a major junction by the late 19th century.

The last timetabled passenger service on what is now, in part, the Nene Valley Railway, left Rugby Midland at 8.55pm on June 4, 1966, bound for Peterborough East.

placeholder image — The last timetabled passenger service on what is now, in part, the Nene Valley Railway, left Rugby Midland at 8.55pm on June 4, 1966, bound for Peterborough East.

From then until the 1960s, the line formed an important connection from Norwich, Cambridge and eastern England to Northampton and the Midlands. Despite this, it did not escape the guillotine of the famed Dr Beeching, who was given the unenviable task of bringing Britain’s railway infrastructure into the modern era by cutting unprofitable lines.

Almost inevitably, services to Northampton and Rugby ceased in 1964 and 1966 respectively, with the line itself transiting passengers for the final time on June 4, 1966 (although it remained open for freight traffic until 1972).

In 1968, the Reverend Richard Paten – a visionary pioneer of heritage volunteer movements – bought a steam locomotive from British Rail for its scrap value of £3,000, with his most likely intention being to exhibit it outside Peterborough Technology College to showcase Peterborough's railway heritage.

However, the idea of the locomotive – which was found to be in good working – meeting such an ignominious end led to an outcry, prompting the Reverend to decide instead to restore it to its full working order.

A year later, the Peterborough Branch of the East Anglian Locomotive Society was formed, with the intention of purchasing and restoring another locomotive.

By 1970, the branch was deemed strong enough to operate independently as the Peterborough Locomotive Society (PLS). In 1971, the PLS held a meeting at which the group's name was changed to 'Peterborough Railway Society' and the concept of what would come to be known as the Nene Valley Railway was officially born.