page_title: Portpatrick and Wigtownshire Joint Railway
section_title: The Portpatrick Railway in the twentieth century
hierarchical_section_title: Portpatrick and Wigtownshire Joint Railway / The Portpatrick Railway in the twentieth century
caption_attribution_description: English: Old Viaduct at Glenluce
context_page_description: The Portpatrick and Wigtownshire Joint Railways was a network of railway lines serving sparsely populated areas of south-west Scotland. The title appeared in 1885 when the previously independent Portpatrick Railway and Wigtownshire Railway companies were amalgamated by Act of Parliament into a new company jointly owned by the Caledonian Railway, Glasgow & South Western Railway, Midland Railway and the London & North Western Railway and managed by a committee called the Portpatrick and Wigtownshire Joint Committee.
  The Portpatrick Railway connected Castle Douglas and Portpatrick, opened in 1861 and 1862 and was intended to revive the transit to the north of Ireland through Portpatrick, although Stranraer actually became the dominant port. The line became known as the Paddy because of its connection to Ireland.
  The Wigtownshire Railway, which ran from a connection with the PPR at Newton Stewart to Whithorn, opened from 1875.
  The PPR route often known as the Port Road, linked Dumfries, via Castle Douglas, with the port towns of Portpatrick and Stranraer. It also formed part of a route by rail and sea from England and Scotland to the north of Ireland.
context_section_description: In the first years of the century, the Manson tablet exchange apparatus (referred to as Manson's travelling tablet catcher) was installed on the line, enabling exchange of the single line tablets at signal boxes at a higher speed than with manual exchange. Acceleration of the fast trains was planned, and the Traffic Manager, Hutchinson, asked of the Engineer, Melville, "I assume that there can be no objection to the inclusive speed of one of our trains being increased from 36 to 40 mph. The road, I take it, is as good as can be found anywhere." Melville replied "There can be no objection at all to the express trains running at the inclusive speed you refer to ..." The acceleration was applied from July 1901.
  At this period loadings on the express trains was increasing, leading to operating difficulties, and from March 1904 it was indicated that the mail train would run in duplicate.
  Regular passenger services ceased on the Garliestown branch on 1 March 1903; Millisle was then renamed Millisle for Garlieston and trains reverted to calling at the original Garliestown station. The railway continued to provide excursion trains to Garliestown in connection with steamer excursions until 1935.
  In 1922 there was a bad derailment near Palnure. When the state of the permanent way was assessed, "the Ministry of Transport was a bit shocked ... so the entire PP&W main line was put under a 45 mph restriction till it could be reballasted and relaid. This was carried out in the next two years."
  In the 1921 grouping the line became part of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS).
  As locomotive designs developed, the difficult route of the Portpatrick an Wigtownshire line was unable to take advantage of large locomotive traction. Smith records that "At the end of March 1939 there came momentous news—official sanction for a 60 ft [18 m]; 4-6-0s to work to Stranraer". On 23 March 1939 a trial run was made with a 4-6-0, with the locomotive and tender separated at Stranraer to turn them. "There was no prospect of the 60 ft turntable being ready before late summer, so they laid longer rails, projecting at each end, on the existing 50 ft turntable. This allowed them to turn a Class 5 4-6-0. The class 5s began to work from Glasgow to Stranraer on 16 April 1939.
  It was about October that the new 60 ft turntable was ready at Stranraer. Class 5X 4-6-0s were drafted in, and were the mainstay of the Stranraer road throughout the war. World War II brought exceptional amounts of traffic to the line.
  Smith records that 36 troop trains traversed the line in April 1940 as British forces were built up in Northern Ireland against the possibility of an enemy invasion of the Republic of Ireland. By the end of the year,
  Large numbers of troops were now stationed in Northern Ireland, and the ordinary passenger [train] service proved quite inadequate for men going on leave to England and Wales. A special sailing had to be provided, with two large trains in connection. A train from London and one from Cardiff worked into Stranraer in the early morning, returning in the evening about 6.30 p.m. These were made up eventually to 16 coaches, each with a buffet car. Siding accommodation at Stranraer was terribly inadequate. They could service only one of those huge trains, so the Cardiff train had to be hauled to Ayr and back each day for servicing. Two Caley [Caledonian Railway] Class 3F 0-6-0s were put on this job.
  Later in the war it was decided that an emergency west coast port should be established, to continue transatlantic trade in the event that Glasgow or Liverpool docks were disabled by enemy action. A new harbour facility was developed on Loch Ryan, called Cairnryan Harbour, and it was served by the Cairnryan Military Railway. This was a considerable undertaking. The new railway joined the Stranraer to Challoch line at Cairnryan Junction, about two miles (about 1 km) east of  Stranraer, facing for trains approaching from the east. The point of junction was later moved closer to Stranraer, at Aird.
  The line opened in July 1942. In the event the port wa
caption: Glenluce Viaduct
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