Description
This is the Daubhill railway crossing on the original line of the railway from Bolton to Chequerbent (later Leigh and Kenyon Junction). This is 200 yards east of Daubhill station closed in 1952. The terrace in the middle of the picture is Southend Street. The gable end at the left is the end of Nixon Road. The line of the railway is now occupied by a swimming school. The smaller notice board refer to the Holiness Tabernacle – renamed Church of the Nazarene in 1952 and still going strong. The chimney and tower with the flagpole are part of the Sunnyside / Tootal Broadhurst Lee complex. The chimney is long gone. The tower is still visible alongside the Lantor mill.
Thank you to David Collier for the caption.
Lantor Mill is actually Rumworth Mill on St Helens Road. The tower and part of the adjoining building are all that remains of Sunnyside Mills, which was a very large site. I remember the chimney being dismantled in 1962.
I was once travelling on a bus on St Helens Road and had a shock when we had to stop at this level crossing and a goods steam train chugged through! That would be about 1963.
According to a survey map from 1927 that must be a coal sidings railway line going towards the mills probably as a transport railway connection meeting the main railway line somewhere on Daubhill station.
yep the tower and flagpole on the mill are no longer there .was taken down deemed unsafe last year sept 2016 .can see from my house on Ellesmere road
I thought this was a picture of me, but it appears to have been taken in 1937. I was not born until 1941. obviously not me.
Andrew, that was the original Kenyon Junction to Bolton Great Moor Street line. A banking engine was necessary to pull trains up the steepest part of the Daubhill incline, as it was known. The line in the photo went as far as Adelaide Street, while the other end of the incline was also there for a long time. This ran from GMS to High Street, going behind Moor Mill and Brigg’s Mill. A new line was constructed with a less steep gradient; it branched off the original line near Shaw Street and went through a tunnel under Heywood Park, close to the other tunnel on the Plodder Lane/Little Hulton (etc) line. The course of this line can still be seen for much of its length. It rejoined the original line just past Deane Church Lane.
The middle part of the old line between High Street and Adelaide Street was lost to housing many years ago, and was approximately on the line of Auburn Street.
We get it – you’re all as old as dinosaur pooh !
I remember slicing my thumb open sliding down the railway embankment at the bottom of Nixon Rd when I was about 7 (1983) but the railway lines were long gone, it became a dump for the local scruffbags. I swore so much some of the tenants of the houses above came out to slap my backside, things were so different back then – strangers gave naughty kids a slap and teachers laid into you. One of them cleaned me up though, turned out to be a mates dad.
It led down to Tootals parks and the other way up past Hulton playing fields and another bridge under Hulton Lane.
We had a den under the bridge at the bottom of Morris Green Lane where we wagged school and played true, dare, kiss, command or promise. I got my first kiss when I was 10 under that bridge, tongue n everyfin lol. I think she dared me to kiss her, she was like 15 and obviouly liked the attention of boys of any age, tried to get me to finger her as well but I was too scared-thought it was gonna eat my hand – proper growler haha. Drinking Babysham at 10 under a bridge and kissing what was virtually a woman to a 10 year old and fondling her breasticles like they were playdoh – it was heaven! Wish I could do it all again, life turned out so empty and lonely!
never knew the line which went cut across rothwell st went to auburn st? always thought it endned at high st and was used buy watsons steel. i can remember the footbridge that went over the line at rothwell st and used to play in the tunnels under bobby heywoods park, also remember tomlinsons coal yard on rupert st as i was living in tildslely st then.