Beaminster Tunnel Opening

Beaminster Tunnel opened on 29th June 1832. It is reckoned to be the only pre-railway road tunnel in the country still in use. The tunnel was built to take the road under Horn Hill thus avoiding a 1 in 6 gradient which was particularly difficult for horse-drawn traffic.

The tunnel was opened with much ceremony with the day being regarded in Beaminster, according to the Dorset County Chronicle, as something of a holiday. Promoter of the project was local solicitor, Giles Russell who raised £13,000 by public subscription.

Celebrations began at 8am with a 21-gun salute fired from a battery on Horn Hill. At 10am a Grand Procession formed which included bands from Beaminster and Bridport, dignitaries from Beaminster and local towns, ‘ladies and gentlemen in around 60 carriages’, 100 visitors on foot followed by a further 200 on horseback. Then followed the many tradesmen who had worked on the project and the labourers who had excavated the tunnel carrying shovels and pick axes. Prominent in the half-mile Grand Procession was the project’s promoter Giles Russell. The tradesmen and labourers were paid the price of a day’s work together with a two and sixpence (12.5p) bonus.

One of the workmen, William Aplin was killed during the tunnel’s construction. He was removing earth from beneath a precipice when a portion fell on him by which he was killed on the spot.

On the arrival of the Grand Procession at the tunnel another 21-gun salute was fired and the bands played ‘God Save the King.’

Forming ‘one of the most enlivening spectacles ever witnessed in this part of the county’, the Grand Procession returned to the town. Dinners were provided at nearly all the inns in the town and the White Hart Inn top table of about 70 sat down to a ‘very superior dinner.’

A fair was held throughout the day on Horn Hill and the day concluded with a firework display and the ascent of a hot-air balloon from the top of Horn Hill. At the time only a few such road tunnels had been built. In commemoration of the opening, Tunnel Fairs were held on Horn Hill regularly on Good Friday up until the 1880s.

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