Hogwarts Express

The Hogwarts Express was the name of the train that ran between London King's Cross Station Platform 9¾ and Hogsmeade station. It made this run about six times a year, maybe more, as needed. It also made the run back again to London at the end of term in June.

The Express dutifully carried students of all years to and from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It travels at the start and end of every term. It is the school's primary method of travel.

Subject ID: 139503

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The Hogwarts Express was the name of the train that ran between London King's Cross Station Platform 9¾ and Hogsmeade station. It made this run about six times a year, maybe more, as needed. It also made the run back again to London at the end of term in June.

The Express dutifully carried students of all years to and from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It travels at the start and end of every term. It is the school's primary method of travel.

The train left Platform 9¾ without fail every 1 September at 11 o'clock in the morning, arriving at Hogsmeade station in the early evening. Some students took the train back to King's Cross Station to go home for the Christmas and Easter holidays, but some did not, as they stayed at Hogwarts.

As we know from early historical accounts, and from the evidence of early woodcuts and engravings, Hogwarts students used to arrive at school in any manner that caught their fancy. Some rode broomsticks (a difficult feat when carrying trunks and pets); others commandeered enchanted carts and, later, carriages; some attempted to Apparate (often with disastrous effects, as the castle and grounds had always been protected with Anti-Apparition Charms), others rode a variety of magical creatures.

In 1827, Ottaline Gambol rose to the office of Minister for Magic, and she made a daring and controversial suggestion to solve the ages-old problem of how to transport hundreds of students to and from Hogwarts Castle every school year without attracting the Muggles' attention.

Intrigued by Muggle technology, the Minister saw the potential of using a Muggle steam locomotive as a secure and comfortable alternative to Portkeys or to unregulated means of travel. The locomotive for the Hogwarts Express itself was originally built by the Muggle engineers at Crewe, in Cheshire, England, in the early-to-mid 19th century.

In 1830, the Ministry of Magic conducted a large-scale operation involving one hundred and sixty-seven Memory Charms, as well as the biggest Concealment Charm ever performed in Britain, in order to acquire the locomotive. The morning after this operation, the residents of Hogsmeade awoke to find the gleaming red Hogwarts Express and a Hogsmeade railway station that had not been there previously, and the Muggle railway employees in Crewe had the feeling they had misplaced something, which stayed with them for the rest of the year.

There was initial resistance from pure-blood families against using a Muggle-built device for wizard transportation. These families claimed that the express was "unsafe, insanitary, and demeaning". This was their stance until the Ministry decreed that students would arrive to school on the train or not attend at all. There is no information on where exactly Hogwarts students were travelling from during the period after the acquisition of the Hogwarts express and the creation of the Hogsmeade station and before the opening of King's Cross Station and the Platform Nine and Three-Quarters in the 1850s.

Subject ID: 139503

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