diff --git a/tests/test_spider_mw.py b/tests/test_spider_mw.py
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..4a431d379
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/test_spider_mw.py
@@ -0,0 +1,77 @@
+
+import logging
+
+from testfixtures import LogCapture
+from twisted.trial.unittest import TestCase
+from twisted.internet import defer
+
+from scrapy import Spider, Request
+from scrapy.utils.test import get_crawler
+from tests.mockserver import MockServer
+
+
+class CommonTestCase(TestCase):
+    @classmethod
+    def setUpClass(cls):
+        cls.mockserver = MockServer()
+        cls.mockserver.__enter__()
+
+    @classmethod
+    def tearDownClass(cls):
+        cls.mockserver.__exit__(None, None, None)
+
+    @defer.inlineCallbacks
+    def crawl_log(self, spider):
+        crawler = get_crawler(spider)
+        with LogCapture() as log:
+            yield crawler.crawl()
+        raise defer.returnValue(log)
+
+
+class LogExceptionMiddleware(object):
+    def process_spider_exception(self, response, exception, spider):
+        logging.warn('Middleware: %s exception caught', exception.__class__.__name__)
+        return None
+
+
+# ================================================================================
+# (1) exceptions from a spider middleware's process_spider_input method
+class ProcessSpiderInputSpider(Spider):
+    name = 'ProcessSpiderInputSpider'
+    custom_settings = {
+        'SPIDER_MIDDLEWARES': {
+            # spider
+            __name__ + '.LogExceptionMiddleware': 10,
+            __name__ + '.FailProcessSpiderInputMiddleware': 8,
+            __name__ + '.LogExceptionMiddleware': 6,
+            # engine
+        }
+    }
+
+    def start_requests(self):
+        yield Request('http://localhost:8998', callback=self.parse, errback=self.errback)
+
+    def parse(self, response):
+        return [{'test': 1}, {'test': 2}]
+
+    def errback(self, failure):
+        self.logger.warn('Got a Failure on the Request errback')
+
+
+class FailProcessSpiderInputMiddleware:
+    def process_spider_input(self, response, spider):
+        logging.warn('Middleware: will raise ZeroDivisionError')
+        raise ZeroDivisionError()
+
+
+class TestProcessSpiderInputSpider(CommonTestCase):
+    @defer.inlineCallbacks
+    def test_process_spider_input_errback(self):
+        """
+        (1) An exception from the process_spider_input chain should not be caught by the
+        process_spider_exception chain, it should go directly to the Request errback
+        """
+        log = yield self.crawl_log(ProcessSpiderInputSpider)
+        self.assertNotIn('Middleware: ZeroDivisionError exception caught', str(log))
+        self.assertIn('Middleware: will raise ZeroDivisionError', str(log))
+        self.assertIn('Got a Failure on the Request errback', str(log))