Links with Nuneham House


Telephone links


1888 agreement


1889 agreement

Telephone link of 1888

A different form of physical link between Nuneham House and the station at Culham was made in 1888 when an agreement was signed between the GWR and Edward William Harcourt allowing for the placement of 'a speaking tube or telephonic instrument' in Culham station together with its associated wiring. One may imagine that previous communication would have been made by sending someone down from the estate with a message or query. How much more convenient it would be to use the cutting edge technology of a phone! Remember that this was only ten years after the very first working telephones arrived in this country. Alexander Graham Bell demonstrated the telephone to Queen Victoria at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight in 1878 with calls to London, Cowes and Southampton. This itself being only two years after he filed his patent application in America.

The agreement stipulates an annual fee of 10 shillings for the privilege. This however seems to have gone up considerably as attached to the agreement is a note from Edward Harcourt dated November 28th 1889 agreeing to pay £2.2s per annum 'for the privilege of placing my telephone at Culham station'. There is no indication when this agreement was terminated, but it is possible that it continued for a good number of years.

Such arrangements for private communication were not confined to those between Nuneham House and the station at Culham. Waddesdon Manor Station Waddesdon Manor Station in 1898


Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

Opened as 'Waddesdon Manor' on 1st January 1897 on the section of the Metropolitan Railway between Aylesbury and Verney Junction, the station was renamed 'Waddesdon' on 1st October 1922. The Metropolitan Railway came under the London Passenger Transport Board in 1933 who closed the station in early July 1936 when they ceased to operate beyond Aylesbury.

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which was built for Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild on the Metropolitan line in the late 1890s, apparently also had a telephone link between the house and station



1908 agreement
1908 agreement

Telephone link of 1908

Possibly in addition to the telephone installed at the station another agreement was entered into in 1908 to facilitate a telephone at the Railway Hotel. This agreement allows for the installation of a telegraph pole on GWR land with an easement for two telephone wires to cross the railway and Company land. The wires were to cross the railway line attached to brackets fixed to the outside parapet of the over-bridge and thence on to the Railway Hotel. There is no indication as to the purpose of the telephone link between the Railway Hotel and Nuneham House but it was short lived as the agreement was terminated as of December 1912. The fee for this easement was set at £1 per annum payable in advance each January.

It is noticeable that the agreement of 1888 is written out in full by hand in beautiful script, whereas the one of 1908 utilises a pre-printed form with manually added detail. The GWR always chose to use the spelling 'shewn' as opposed to 'shown' in all publications and this form is used in the 1908 agreement when it states the position and direction of the wires is 'shewn on the plan hereunto annexed'.

1908 drawing

The plan attached to the agreement shows the proposed route for the wires, and usefully documents what the track layout was at the time together with the relative position of the station buildings. The footbridge has yet to be built at Culham, and the passenger foot crossing between the two platforms can be seen by the signal box. No visible signs remain, but reference to the drawing reveals what looks to be two gate posts and a gate which would have marked the entrance to the private road to Nuneham House.

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~~ All images on this page are reproduced by courtesy of the Wiltshire & Swindon History Centre in Chippenham ~~
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