Castle Douglas and Dumfries Railway

The line was one of the 1965 Beeching closures, except for a stub from Dumfries to Maxwelltown Oil Terminal which continued until 1994, although it was dormant in the latter years.

In the middle of the nineteenth century the counties of Galloway, Wigtownshire and Kirkcudbrightshire[note 1] were devoted to agriculture, but lacked efficient land communications links with the rest of the United Kingdom.

Mail from the northern part of England, and Scotland, to Ireland passed this way through the ports of Portpatrick and Donaghadee, but the poor roads made the passage difficult.

[note 2] In the same year the GD&CR merged with other lines to form the Glasgow and South Western Railway (G&SWR).

Both points were a considerable distance from Portpatrick, and when local interests promoted a railway connecting Castle Douglas to Dumfries, the G&SWR encouraged the scheme, seeing it as a first step in its plans.

Local interests found the remainder, and a Bill was presented to Parliament; it attracted little opposition and the authorising Act for the Castle Douglas and Dumfries Railway was passed on 21 July 1856.

In Tales of the Glasgow and South Western Railway, Smith records that All west of Lochanhead was single line then.

[note 4][8][page needed]Smith amplifies the detail in his The Little Railways of South-West Scotland: The goods train was the 11:30 a.m. from Dumfries to Stranraer; Driver John Robb received a ticket at Lochanhead; asked if he had seen the staff "he could not remember clearly".

[9][page needed] The line left Dumfries station curving immediately westwards and south-westwards, through difficult terrain.