A plaque has been unveiled to mark the location of what is probably York’s shortest-ever railway.

The ‘ordnance railway’ was built to carry ammunition and other stores from a wharf on the River Ouse at New Walk just a few meters inland to the city’s ordnance depot which once stood between what is now Ordnance Lane and Hospital Fields Road.

Last uncovered when the Millennium Bridge was being built, the tracks were uncovered again in April by a team of volunteers from Goodgym, working with the Friends of New Walk.

The Friends, together with the Fishergate, Fulford and Heslington local history society, received a small grant from Fishergate ward councillors to help pay for the plaque, which was unveiled this afternoon by former National Railway Museum director Andrew Scott.

“Before the days of articulated lorries, when the River Ouse was a commercial highway, many of the supplies sent to York for the army came by sea and river, then up this little railway,” Mr Scott told a small gathering.

York Press:

Visitors study a small temporary exhibition at New Walk about the 'Ordnance Railway'. Picture: Chris Rainger

“One of the things that was delivered was ammunition, typically for training here and at other sites like Strensall. It came from Woolwich Arsenal, alongside the Thames in south London.

“And because there was concern about sparks, at least at first, it came to York not in a steel steamship but in an archaic wooden sailing boat. It tied up here at the jetty and the ammunition was lifted from the boat by a crane and carried into the stores on the little tramway.”

Chris Rainger of the Fishergate, Fulford and Heslington local history society, who did much of the research into the railway, said he had been intrigued by it ever since first seeing the tracks when they were briefly uncovered more than 20 years ago.

“I thought ‘what is this?’” he said.

He said every time they were uncovered, people came up to him with theories about what the tracks were – including suggesting that they provided a link to York railway station.

York Press:

The uncovered 'Ordnance Railway' tracks, with the River Ouse and Millennium Bridge behind. Picture: Stephen Lewis

Now the tiny railway line’s history is there for all to see, outlined in the plaque attached to the brick wall running beside New Walk near the Millennium Bridge, where the track used to pass through a gate to the ordnance depot.

“These tracks caried munitions into the army depot behind this wall from the 1890s until the 1950s, delivered by a ‘Poweder Boat from Woolwich arsenal in London,” the plaque says.

  • Don't miss Monday's Press for a full history of the 'Ordnance Railway'