The Lost Streets of Wolverton

Almost 175 years ago Wolverton was the talk of the nation. Steam locomotive power was able to transport goods and passengers between London and Birmingham at hitherto unheard of speeds, and Wolverton was, of necessity, the stopping point for refreshment and vehicle maintenance. The London and Birmingham Railway, several years in the planning, opened in September 1838. Within a year, a maintenance workshop at a midway point between London and Birmingham were complete and workers accommodation formed the beginnings of the town. The small town grew quickly on the back of the astonishing success of the railway and within a decade the population had outstripped that of the neighbouring coaching town of Stony Stratford.

While Wolverton survives today as a part of Milton Keynes, very few traces of the original town survive. Indeed there is very little evidence that the railway works, once stretching a mile westward from the station, once dominated the town and the area and at its peak provided employment for over 5,000. This book tells the story of the foundation and building of the new town in rural North Buckinghamshire and attempts to reconstruct the early settlement from surviving resources.