The 1965 Valentine’s Day massacre of the iconic 'Derry Road'

Valentine’s Day is most commonly associated with love. But for the North-West it also marks the end of an almost 120 year relationship with the island’s rail network.   

The first passenger rail services in the world began in England in 1825, and the technology reached Ireland by 1934 with the opening of the 6 mile ‘Dublin and Kingstown Railway’ (the world’s first commuter rail service). It wasn’t until 1847 - the bleakest year of the Famine/An Gorta Mór – that rail finally made its way to the north-west as part of the newly established ‘Londonderry and Enniskillen Railway’.

Its route and construction began at Derry’s old Foyle Road Station on the Cityside of the river, and from there traced the Foyle valley south towards Strabane - via Carrigans, Porthall, St Johnston and Carrickmore. These railway stations had the honour of being the first to open in the North West in 1847 – and would also be the last to close in Donegal when the curtain came down on this crucial route 118 years later.

By 1853 construction of the line had reached south to Fintona. A station of that name was opened in the village, but 3 years later the line was reconfigured and a separate ‘Fintona Junction’ station added nearby.

The original Fintona stop was therefore reduced to a terminus at the end of a small branch line, with all mainline services routed instead through the new Junction station. In 1883 passenger rail services were withdrawn entirely from the short section of track between Fintona and Fintona Junction, and replaced instead with a horse-drawn double-decker tram.

It remained in operation until 1957, and the tram itself can be seen today in the Ulster Transport Museum in Cultra.

By 1854 the Derry and Enniskillen Railway had reached its end point in Fermanagh. In 1862 the company renamed itself the Irish North Western Railway, before later merging with the Ulster Railway (which operated between Belfast and Monaghan) to form the Great Northern Railway in 1876. It was at this stage that the section of the Derry to Enniskillen line north of Omagh became part of what was known as ‘The Derry Road’ – the mainline rail route between the north-west and both Dublin and Belfast, via Portadown.  

The Derry Road proved to be a great commercial success for much of its existence, and was the most important rail route in Ulster for over a century. As the mainline between the island’s two largest cities and the north-west, it played a central role in people’s lives - stimulating significant economy activity all along its route, and hosting everything from livestock to workers, and soldiers to ‘emigrant trains’.

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The first blow to its fortunes came in the 1920s, however, when the arrival of motorised road vehicles combined with the global economic depression to severely impact passenger and freight demand. The Second World War provided a temporary boost, with the line used to ferry troops and munitions (and also for cross-border smuggling by civilians).

The end of the war saw the old challenges return and amplify, however, made worse by the roads-focus of the new Ulster Transport Authority (UTA). It had been established by the 1948 Northern Transport Act, which saw Stormont nationalise all rail and bus services north of the border - a move which would eventually lead to the decimation of rail across the entire west of the province of Ulster.

The UTA began closing a series of rail lines in the 1950s, including the section of the old Derry and Enniskillen line south of Omagh in 1957. That removed rail entirely from Fermanagh, and left the ‘Derry Road’ increasingly isolated. In 1962 the notorious Dr Richard Beeching – the architect of the closure of vast swathes of Britain’s railways – recommended that a similar rationalisation be conducted for Northern Ireland. Stormont responded by commissioning its own ‘Benson Report’ into the future of rail in NI, and when it was published in 1963 it recommended mothballing the Derry-Portadown line.

By that stage it was the last remaining stretch of rail anywhere in counties Donegal or Tyrone. 

When the Derry Road carried its last train on St Valentine’s Day in 1965 it marked the end of an almost 120 year love affair with rail for much of the North-West. And it also severed a key transport artery between the region and both Dublin and Belfast.

Needless to say, the promises which were made of motorway replacements never transpired. The 14th February 1965 was therefore to be a Valentine’s Day Massacre for rail in the north-west, and the start of decades of infrastructure isolation for Donegal and Tyrone.

Video: Brian Wilson