Aston-on-Trent History Walk No.6 - Aston Tramway

The Aston-on-Trent Local History Group have produced a series of local walks to highlight the heritage of Aston-on-Trent, a cosy village whose records of settlement date all the way back to before the Norman Conquest in the 11th Century, and the surrounding area.

Walk No.6 is predominantly flat, easy walking. Most of the Aston-on-Trent walks use countryside paths at points along the route, so please be mindful of weather and ground conditions when planning a walk.

Below are some of the key points of interest to keep an eye out for:

• Post Office
  • The current post office building has a long history of trading as a local shop before the post office came to be. Before that, the village post office was based in a cottage on The Green.
• The Pump
  • Erected in 1870, this shelter formerly housed the water pump that supplied the village, until Aston-on-Trent was connected to the water mains in the 1920s. Following that, it was used as a shelter for a bus stop, but now adorns the village as monument piece. Next to the pump, is Pump Cottage which was once split between two shops – a butcher and a grocer.
• Aston Garage
  • This building was originally used as a malthouse, where barley was dried prior to being used in the brewing process. The Tudor facing on the garage is actually a post-Tudor façade. It was opened as a garage in the 1930s and continued trading as a garage until its final closure. Formerly, petrol pumps stood just behind the main doors and paraffin could be purchased during the times when much of the village still relied on it for producing heating and lighting. The Notsa café/restaurant currently residing in the garage opened in 2023 and is named for Aston – just spelled backwards!
• Brickyard Plantation
  • The Brickyard Plantation, also known simply as Aston Brickyard, a nine-acre site of mixed woodland and grassland on the northern side of the village that serves as a nature reserve. The site was formerly a gypsum mine in the 18th Century and played a key part in the local production of bricks, before the Derby Brick Company opened up new sites in the area and demand helped the businesses survive until the 1960s. After its closure, the Brickyard would eventually become a refuse tip until it was capped with clay. The Brickyards Plantation that exists today is a result of the hard work of the local villagers, who are responsible for much of the work in planting the trees to regreen the area.
• The Tramway
  • The former tramway was a light railway that helped serve the Aston brickmaking industry and connected the Brickyard gypsum mine to a wharf along the Trent and Mersey Canal, operating from 1812 until the early 1900s. Under Derby Road – the main road through the village that passes by many of the points on this walk – is a tunnel in which the tramway actually ran.
• Aston Cursus
  • A Neolithic earthwork dating to around 3500 BC around which now sits a patch of uncultivated land, roughly one acre in size, and the site as a whole is a Listed Scheduled Monument. The Cursus would have taken the form of two parallel ditches and would have been used for traditional ceremonial purposes, such as the veneration of ancestors.

Please visit the Aston-on-Trent Local History Group‘s page for the route directions, as well as more information on key points along the route.

A PDF of the walk can be accessed at the Aston-on-Trent Parish Council‘s website or via the download file button below.