The Pensnett Railway

In 1829, while George Stephenson was building his "Rocket," the Earl of Dudley ran "Agenori" on his pioneering Black Country railway linking his collieries with the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal. Although it rarely carried passengers, this railway grew into a huge complex industrial system that centered on the Earl’s Round Oak Steel Works at Brierley Hill. Its tracks ran to Dudley, Old Hill, Cradley Heath, Himley, Baggeridge Colliery, Kingswinford, and Ashwood Basin. Its steam locomotives worked inside the steel works, and brought in coal from the nearby pits, as well as delivering coal to a number of wharves and industrial enterprises scattered around the western half of the Black Country. Steam operation ceased in 1962, but the railway continued to work until Round Oak Steel Works closed in 1980. This book describes the system and its workings as well its history and the locomotives and men who served the line. It guides the reader in trying to relate all of this to the few remains of it that can be seen today.