Bewdley the headquarters for the Free French officer cadets. The cadets consisted of 200 teenagers who undertook military training at Ribbesford House until they joined with other allied forces in the D Day invasion. Bewdley is now governed by three tiers of local government; in increasing order of size: Bewdley town council, Wyre Forest district council and Worcestershire county council. For many centuries Bewdley had its own Member of Parliament (MP), most famously the Conservative Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin who represented it from 1908–1937, but in 1950 the Bewdley constituency was abolished and the town was included in the Kidderminster constituency.
Droitwich Spa Junction continue via the famous Lickey Incline en route to Birmingham New Street. Droitwich Spa signal box controls the junction and is located between the diverging lines. The whole of the junction is controlled by semaphore signals from the British Rail Western Region era. The box interfaces with the West Midlands Signal Control Centre, Stourbridge Desk(at Saltley) on the main line towards Kidderminster and West Midlands Signal Control Centre, Bromsgrove Desk (at Saltley) on the branch, using the Track Circuit Block system - the latter becomes a single line just beyond the junction and remains so until joining the main line