Display options Mobile Site map

Wandsworth Council

Out of hours contact details

Story of Wandsworth

The Surrey Iron Railway

Photo of the Surrey Iron Railway display at Wandsworth Museum
Surrey Iron Railway

The Surrey Iron Railway - the world's first public railway - opened in 1803. It ran from Croydon to Wandsworth, close to the route of the River Wandle.

It was built to transport the products of the Wandle mills to Wandsworth. They were then shipped along the Thames to London.

The railway was designed to carry horse-drawn vehicles and was open for use by anyone, on payment of a toll. Unfortunately it was not a financial success and, from the 1830s, had to compete with the new steam railways. The Surrey Iron Railway Company went out of business in 1846.

  1. Introduction
  2. Prehistoric times
  3. Roman lives
  4. Medieval villages
  5. Tudor and Stuart times
  6. Civil war
  7. Refugees from Europe
  8. Georgian Wandsworth
  9. The Mayor of Garratt
  10. You are here: The Surrey Iron Railway
  11. The railway revolution
  12. Factories and furnaces
  13. Building the suburbs
  14. Schools and other services
  15. Time off
  16. Radical Battersea
  17. The First World War
  18. The 1920s and 1930s
  19. The Second World War
  20. Into the 50s
  21. A new landscape
  22. The Festival of Britain and the Coronation
  23. The 1960s – amalgamation of the boroughs
  24. The Changing face of Wandsworth

Bookmark this page

print send to a friend feedback

Advertising policy