The Iron Road

The Iron Road,: in March 1982 and June 1983.

The Iron Road (in the trees) from the track from Efrafa.

Here's how Holly describes his first encounter with a railway embankment:

From chapter 27, 'You Can't Imagine it Unless You've Been There.':

'The patrol that was after us could actually follow us in the dark and rain faster than we could run away and before long they were close behind. I was just going to tell the others that there was nothing for it but to turn and fight when we came to a great, steep bank that seemed to slope almost straight up to into the air. It was steeper that this hillside below us here, and the slope seemed to be regular, as if men had made it.
'Well, there was no time to think about it, so up we went. It was covered with rough grass and bushes. I don't know how far it was to the top exactly, but I should guess it was as high a well grown rowan tree - perhaps a little higher....'

Efrafa from the Iron Road.

Over the bridge over the Iron Road.

Holly was right, but he was describing a different railway. Well - yes and no, he was describing a steam railway and not an diesel railway. Here is the view back to Efrafa from a bridge that carries the track that runs south from the Crixa and a rabbit's eye view back over that bridge from the southern side. This railway line runs from Basingstoke, where it branches off the main London-Southampton line, to Salisbury where it joins the Southampton to Exeter route. This was once the route of the great Atlantic Coast Express, forever associated with the magnificent Merchant Navy locomotives. Now it is a secondary route and there are few through trains from London. How do we know it was a steam railway in Watership Down? Well, as you look from the bridge carrying this track over the Iron road itself, consider the following words as Holly continues:

Blackberry here knows all sorts of interesting facts about Watership Down.

The Efrafans were wary of going beyond
the Iron Road, and assumed that no other rabbits would either, thus the wide patrols missed Hazel’s rabbits. In the film the situation
is more confused, probably to make
Bigwig’s entry into Efrafa more dramatic:
the area just beyond the Iron Road is the
scene of one of Blackavar and
Hyzenthlay’s last breakout attempts.

The Iron Road looking towards Whitchurch

The Iron Road running towards Whitchurch.

'When we got to the top we found ourselves on small, light stones that shifted as we ran on them. That gave us away completely. Then we came upon broad, flat pieces of wood and two great, fixed bars of metal that made a noise - a kind of low, humming noise in the dark. I was just saying to myself, 'This is men's work all right when I fell over the other side.
I hadn't realized that

the whole top of the bank was only a very short distance across and the other side was just as steep. I went head over heels down the bank in the dark and fetched up against an elder bush: and there I lay.'
Holly stopped and fell silent, as though pondering on what he remembered. At last he said, 'It's going to be hard to describe to you what happened next... And then - then an enormous thing - I can't give you any idea of it - as big as a thousand hrududil - bigger - came rushing out of the night. It was full of smoke and light and it roared and beat on the metal lines until the ground shook beneath it....

An S15 (30825 in Barry scrapyard)
Frith's messenger? An S15, typical of the type
of loco that ran on the Iron Road.

Yes, it was steam, and anyway Holly said the embankment '...was covered with rough grass and bushes.' In steam days the embankments were regularly cleared and treated with weedkiller from special trains. This was to reduce the ever-present risk of lineside fires. The Merchant Navies had a tendency to catch fire themselves bringing the odd but embarrassing situation of the fire brigade being called upon to put out a steam engine! Most of the trees you can see either side of the track had grown up in the fifteen years since the end of steam in 1967. My best guess would be that Holly's great messenger from Frith was actually a Ex-LSWR Urie S15 such as this, or slightly less likely, a C1. Both were regulars on goods trains over this line which runs from Basingstoke to Salisbury.

Click Bigwig here to return to select another picture. Be careful of his ears, his fleas live there!