Great Northern Railway and London & North Western Railway Joint Line from Market Harborough to Bottesford and Saxondale via Melton Mowbray

Long Clawson & Hose Station

If Harby & Stathern Station excited wonder for being an isolated railway depot, that at Long Clawson and Hose prompted astonishment. It was situated on the northern slope of the jutting ironstone bluff which includes Holwell village, in fact Hose Tunnel was driven through this mass. The station was only some hundred yards from the tunnel mouth. It was difficult to access from the public road, with the approach road leaving the public road at right angles, and ascended sharply through bushes and trees, which made the station have the appearance of being hidden. The station frontage was narrow and cramped, with the goods yard extending northward from the passenger station. A small station which did little in the way of traffic, and not to be wondered at when it is considered that Hose was two and a half miles from the station, and, in actual fact as near to Harby. Long Clawson was two and a half miles away as the crow flies and nearly four miles by road. Around the station only an isolated farm existed, while the staff dwellings were remote from the station and alongside the public road. In the course of years these dwellings were added to and amounted to nine at the closure. No doubt the Joint Line had to build houses to attract workmen for this lonely section. The station finally lost status and came under the control of the station master at Scalford. Remote as it was an interesting weekly duty was carried out here, on the Grantham Canal at Hose there used to be some workshops for carpenters, and, these men were paid their wages at Long Clawson and Hose Station.

Clawson Tunnel (sometimes called Hose) was 834 yards long and was listed for block telegraph purposes which provide regulations for platelayers' trolleys passing through. It also caused delays to trains on account of the gradient, trains often "sticking", with sometimes the front part of the train in the tunnel. It was the only real tunnel on the Joint Line, although there is a tunnel half a mile south of East Norton Station, it is very short and was not officially listed.

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