3-074-652 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Barking and Pitsea Extension Railway: views on the line, 1883. 'Hornchurch; Upminster Church & Vicarage; Upminster...On Thursday, the 11th October, at the pleasant Essex village of Upminster, about three miles south-east of Romford, the first turf was cut of a new line of railway direct from Barking to Pitsea, by which the journey between London and Southend will be greatly shortened...The Directors of the London, Tilbury, and Southend Railway have shown their sagacity and enterprise in promptly undertaking this desirable work, and their direct line to Southend, when completed, will probably cause an increased resort to that salubrious marine holiday-place, while it must confer great local benefits upon the intermediate rural district...The proposed line passes by Dagenham, Hornchurch, Upminster, Warley, Dunton, and the Langdon and Laindon Hills, through a pleasant and fertile agricultural country...and it will afford many agreeable residential sites. Hornchurch and Upminster are thriving villages of some antiquarian note, with several fine old mansions and wooded parks in the neighbourhood'. From "Illustrated London News", 1883.