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The Derwent Valley Railway was a branch railway in County Durham, England, that ran from Swalwell (now in Tyne and Wear) to Blackhill via five intermediate stations . The line was twin track from Swalwell to Lintz Green and single track from there to Blackhill.
The Derwent Valley Railway was opened in 1867 after three years hard building work. Four viaducts were constructed and a deep, 800 metres long cutting was dug near Rowlands Gill. The Nine Arches Viaduct was one of the major engineering feats of the railway. It is five hundred feet long and was built because the Earl of Strathmore would not allow the railway to pass through the Gibside Estate.[1]
At its peak in 1914 the railway was carrying over half a million passengers a year with a regular goods traffic of timber, bricks and coal to Newcastle and iron ore to Consett.[2]
The railway is notable for an unsolved murder that occurred at Lintz Green railway station. The stationmaster, Joseph Wilson, met his death on the night of 7 October 1911. No satisfactory explanation was ever forthcoming despite one of the most intensive murder investigations ever carried out in the North East of England.[3]
High Westwood Station was closed in 1942 while the remaining stations survived into the 1950s. The line finally closed on 11 November 1963.[2]
Little then happened until Durham County Council had the foresight to develop it as a country park. The viaducts and bridges were repaired and the track-bed has now become an excellent Tyneside alternative finishing section to the C2C cycle route.[4]
The railway is commemorated in the Geordie folk song about an ill-fated train journey from Rowlands Gill, Wor Nanny's a Mazer.[1]