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DESPITE many false alarms since 2016, Britain could well leave the European Union in 2020. What, however, is not for one minute shrouded in a veil of uncertainty and doubt is the fact that the Great Western Society will, in Birmingham on February 8, be presented with the Heritage Railway Association’s (HRA) new Chairman’s Special Award for an achievement of particular distinction – the culmination of a marathon 45-year project to re-create a Churchward Saint 4-6-0, one of the most influential locomotive types in UK railway history. No. 2999 Lady of Legend invites direct parallels with the story of Britain‘s EU membership. For the purchase of No. 4942 Maindy Hall from Dai Woodham’s Barry scrapyard, the locomotive which has been ‘devolved’ into a unique example of the predecessor of its…
IN WHAT might well be as an unexpected ‘sequel’to Charles Dickens’definitive seasonal novel A Christmas Carol, a rediscovered letter from the author has revealed that the novelist may have spent his last festive season without the traditional fare of a turkey – because the Great Western Railway had accidentally set it on fire! A real-life Ghost of Christmas Past has resurfaced in the archives of the National Railway Museum (NRM) at York, in the form of a long-lost letter written by Charles Dickens just a few months before his death in Gads Hill Place, Higham, Kent, on June 9, 1870. The letter responds to the GWR which accidently set fire to a parcel containing a 30lb turkey which had been destined for Dickens’ dinner table on Christmas Day. Dated two…
WHEN Bulleid West Country light Pacific No. 34027 Taw Valley suffered a broken spring on the first Saturday of the Severn Valley Railway’s Santa trains from Kidderminster, the hero of the hour turned out to be the least likely of all locomotives under the circumstances. Ivatt 2-6-0 No. 43106 and BR Standard 4MT No. 75069 ran the Kidderminster services on November 30 with assistance from steam-heat Class 40 No. 40106. Plans were made at Bridgnorth to dispatch GWR 4-6-0 No. 6960 Raveningham Hall to cover for No. 34027 on the Sunday, having operated the Bridgnorth trains in top-and-tail mode with GWR 0-6-0PT No. 7714. That solved one problem, but needing a second engine for the Bridgnorth trains on the Sunday, up stepped diminutive Port Talbot Railway/GWR 0-6-0ST No. 813 –…
NEW-BUILD GWR 4-6-0 No. 6880 Betton Grange passed its steam test on Friday, December 6 – paving the way for the locomotive to be reassembled at the Llangollen Railway, where it could make its debut in 2020. A project landmark was reached on Friday, November 15 when the boiler passed its hydraulic test at Tyseley Locomotive Works, coinciding with the 6880 Betton Grange Society Ltd’s annual meeting there the following day. Accordingly, a first fire was lit with chairman Quentin McGuinness doing the honours with the shovel in front of a large group of members who witnessed history in the making. The boiler was kept warm for a further week, culminating in it passing its out-of-frames steam test under the scrutiny of the boiler inspector, paving the way for it…
NORTH Bay Railway Engineering has landed the contract to return Llanberis Lake Railway-based Quarry Hunslet 0-4-0ST No. 493 of 1889 Thomas Bach to working order by next summer. The locomotive, which has not steamed for seven years but has a new boiler built by Bennetts, was taken by low loader to North Bay’s Darlington workshop in December for reassembly. North Bay co-director David Humphreys said:“The contract will give us four months’ work. It could be steaming by next summer.” As reported last issue, the company, the engineering arm of Scarborough’s North Bay Railway, is constructing a replica of Ffestiniog Railway pioneer George England 0-4-0STT Mountaineer, with the firebox now assembled. It is also building a replica of 3ft gauge Sharp Stewart 2-4-0T for the Southwold Railway Trust, the frames having…
BRITAIN’S first and longest-running standard gauge new-build steam project – the Great Western Society’s Saint 4-6-0 No. 2999 Lady of Legend – has crowned its first year in operation by scooping the Heritage Railway Association’s (HRA) new Chairman’s Special Award 2020, for an achievement of particular distinction, it has been announced. The project – to back-convert Barry scrapyard hulk No. 4942 Maindy Hall into a new example of the Churchward class from which its design evolved – took more than 45 years from the day it was bought and moved to Didcot Railway Centre, until April 5, 2019, when TV’s Bake Off presenter Prue Leith officially launched it into traffic (issue 254). The completion of the project filled a major void in the heritage steam fleet. The Saints incorporated many…
