Wilts & Dorset Recollections

2016 | Transportation

The 75th volume in this growing series taking a nostalgic look at Britain's transport heritage...When Edwin Coombes started a bus service between Amesbury and Salisbury via the Woodford Valley, he used the title Wilts & Dorset. At that time the Wilts & Dorset Bank had recently been absorbed into Lloyds Bank, and Coombes, not wanting to see the old name disappear completely, used it for his bus service.Wilts & Dorset Motor Services Limited was registered at Companies House in January 1915, and the company's red buses were soon a familiar sight in Salisbury and the surrounding area. Following nationalisation in 1948, Wilts & Dorset acquired control of Venture at Basingstoke in January 1951, which resulted in the company's buses running on a number of routes that went nowhere near Wiltshire or Dorset.In 1972 the Wilts & Dorset name disappeared from the sides of buses when the company was subsumed into Hants & Dorset, but the title reappeared 11 years later with the Wilts & Dorset Bus Company being formed when Hants & Dorset was divided into smaller units in 1983.This book illustrates the eventful story of Wilts & Dorset Motor Services and the Wilts & Dorset Bus Company, not forgetting the 11-year period when the buses ran under the Hants & Dorset name.

It also brings the narrative up to date, illustrating the development of the Wilts & Dorset Bus Company into Salisbury Reds and Morebus.

Christopher Harris (Author)