Table of contents for May 2026 in Steam Days

Our previous article – ‘Castlethorpe’s railway story: the first 120 years’ – was published in the February 2026 issue of Steam Days and covered the coming of the railway, on September 17, 1838 as the last section of the London & Birmingham Railway main line, the addition of its famous water troughs in July 1862, and then the provision of Castlethorpe station about ¾ mile north of these at the time when the section of line from Bletchley to Roade was quadrupled. It opened on August 1, 1882 and had platforms on all four lines, two of these flanking the Down Fast and Up Slow and an island provided between the Up Fast and Down Slow and serving both. The 1901 census recorded the population of Castlethorpe as 539 and…

The idea for this article probably started when I was at school in 1953. Up till then we railway enthusiasts had enjoyed the extensive but ‘normal’ variety of steam locomotive classes that the resort town of Bournemouth enjoyed on its regular train services at Central station. Expresses and semi-fasts to and from London Waterloo were shared among Merchant Navy and lighter Bulleid Pacifics, the Lord Nelsons and King Arthurs. Secondary and stopping trains could bring more ‘Arthurs,’ as well as H15 and S15 4-6-0s, Maunsell Moguls (U and N classes) and Drummond 4-4-0s, namely the T9, D15, S11, L12, L11 and K10 classes. Local pushpull trains were exclusively worked by M7 0-4-4Ts. By then, the older favourites such as the ‘Paddlebox’ T14s had been withdrawn. Any Central station shunting was…

Established by Act of Parliament in 1865, the Talyllyn Railway (TR) came into being to transport slate from Bryneglwys Quarry, an isolated spot on high ground about a mile south-east of Abergynolwyn, and along the Fathew valley to Towyn where trans-shipment to the Aberystwyth & Welsh Coast Railway offered access to the necessary markets for the business. While a passenger operation was always planned, it is of note that this was only between Towyn and Abergynolwyn, 6¾ miles, and the section beyond there (ultimately to the quarry) was considered to be a mineral line and remained so throughout the company years, December 1866 to the end of the 1950 season. This top section of line was rarely photographed in such times, although it did have some interesting features, such as…

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The Caledonian Railway 49 and 903 class 4-6-0s I was very interested to read David Anderson’s account of J F McIntosh’s splendid 6ft 6in 4-6-0s – Steam Days, February 2025. Very brief contemporary footage of a McIntosh Dunalstair IV 4-4-0 in action and its prime exists, oh that a similar record was not also made of one of these engines in full cry! I think the rather longer (30 cf 23 year) life of the first two engines is quite readily explained. Not only were new cylinders, re-designed in November 1923, fitted in early LMS days, but also around this period, new frames, that had been re-designed in April 1920. Furthermore, a third boiler, containing somewhat shorter and fewer, but larger diameter firetubes, had also quickly been built as a…

A lnwick station was built at the end of the short branch line from Bilton Junction (renamed ‘Alnmouth’ from May 1892) that linked the attractive market town with the Newcastle-Edinburgh section of the East Coast main line; the original single-platform station was opened in early October 1850. On September 5, 1887, a new terminal station replaced the old one – this had two platforms and an overall roof and catered not just for Alnmouth trains but also for trains on the new branch line to/from Cornhill-on-Tweed, very near to Coldstream, on the Scottish Border. Passenger trains to Cornhill ceased in September 1930 but goods traffic persisted on this route until British Railways days – the longest lived section was Wooler to Coldstream, which was taken out of use on March…

In the Plymouth suburbs some 1¾ miles east of the city’s North Road station, there can be no denying that Laira motive power depot was very much my second home during the early and mid ‘fifties. It was located just a stone’s throw from my grandmother’s home where I lived at that time, until my school days were over and I left my West Country haunts to work away in the County Courts service within East Anglia. My photographic efforts within the depot itself were centred mainly on the splendid coaling line where after mid-day the light was in the right quarter, with afternoon and evening visits proving the most rewarding. Locomotives working into Laira during the preceding hours would still be awaiting the attention of members of staff tasked…