Prototype Tim Mills' Photos

[timbowales]

The first coach behind 76025 seems to be a Gresley full brake?

 

[djparkins]

It took me a while to catch up with all this extra information and in between times we've had Guildex and some things I had to deal with at the big railway in Loughborough plus an enjoyable time at Baker Street for a Hidden London tour. More to follow, eventually, about that. However here I am again.

Thanks Barry @Barry37. That's an interesting and quite believable bit of folklore. And to Dave @Dave Holt for the additional stuff. I certainly saw some Ivatt Class 4s at Eastleigh with fitted tablet catchers but I think that was after they'd left the M & GN. They were in pretty dismal condition.

Jon @John Palmer - such a lot of lovely stuff there. It's taken me a while to collect it all together in a form so I could file it against each photo but now it's done. Then Dave @Dave Holt and Martin @Martin Shaw with even more to add to it. Thank you all.

A view from the train with an unidentified locomotive but possibly a Standard Class 4 4-6-0 passing another Standard Class 4 4-6-0, 75072 near Midford on 9th June 1962. 75072 was a Bath Green Park loco and had been since June 1956 but it moved to Templecombe S & D in November 1962 where it was withdrawn in January 1966. (SLS). It was scrapped in April the same year at T W Ward, Ringwood. (BR Database).

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Another view from the same train at an unknown location.

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4F 0-6-0 44417 with a Standard Class 4, probably 75071, standing in the middle road. The 4F was leaving Wincanton for Evercreech Junction (only that Station Totem doesn’t look as though it could possibly be Wincanton so I suspect it’s leaving Evercreech Junction for Wincanton) and had been allocated to Templecombe from at least 1948. It was withdrawn from there in November 1962. (SLS). The Railway Observer advises it went to Derby Works for disposal, completed in May 1963. 75071 was allocated to Bath Green Park in June 1956 and then Templecombe S & D in November 1962. It was in store in June, reinstated on the LMR in July and allocated to Croes Newydd in August, all in 1964. It went to Stoke in June 1967 and was withdrawn the following August. (SLS). It was scrapped at Bird’s Long Marston at the end of February 1968.

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I suspect this is a more likely location for the photo above. It’s Standard Class 5 73054 on the 9.55 Bournemouth West to Liverpool overtaking 4F 44417 at Evercreech Junction on 9th September 1962. For details on 44417 see my previous post. 73054 was allocated to Bath Green Park in April 1961, went in to store in August 1965 and was withdrawn at the end of the same month. (SLS). It was scrapped at Cashmore’s, Newport in October 1965. (BR Database).

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Brian

Apologies for the late response but whilst at secondary school in Ringwood l recall seeing two BR 75xxx in Wards Scrapyard alongside Ringwood station as some of us took a short cut on the school cross-country run! This was about the time referred to in your notes. At that time there were still two freights a day into Ringwood. The morning one was steam hauled and the afternoon one tended to be a Class 33 working.

As an aside, we thought we’d stopped long enough observing the station and scrapyard to make our arrival time back at school look about right - but we were intercepted off-route by the PE teacher and got 40 minutes detention running around the school athletics track!

 

[LarryG]

Re. post # 3957; The coach behind the dirty Bulleid is an LMS ex Ambulance coach rebuilt into a 57' full brake.

 

[David B]

Tim’s S&D photos are an absolute joy, casting new light on a much-photographed line. I also love the photos from the Up Bristolian. The Reading General shot shows the train running through on the centre road, where it would normally have been travelling at around 80 mph. There was something special about running non-stop through Reading - partly because it was rare, and partly because of the intensity of the physical experience….galloping through Tilehurst and rounding the gentle left hand bend at Scours Lane at speed, then clattering over the points and diamonds at Reading West junction before leaning right to hammer over the multitude of crossings just outside the station, then twisting left as the heavily canted centre road curved through the station, hemmed in by the awnings on platforms 4 and 5, with the sound reverberating all around as the loco was opened up again for Paddington. Deep joy! And here is Tim leaning out of the window to enjoy the moment, and catching the down Cathedrals Express as it too made its way non-stop through Reading, potentially (although we’ll never know) at a closing speed of up to 160mph. I marvel at the technical skill involved - I know from leaning out at the same spot that the curvature gives you minimal time to be prepared for a fast train coming the other way (and I accept that both trains might have been checked through the station and therefore travelling more slowly). But then look at the sharpness of his photo from the same train passing Swindon, where again you could expect to be travelling at 80mph. Very impressive. I recall that the Bristolian coaching stock was equipped with Swindon’s brand new experimental B4 bogies in 1962, so perhaps the clarity of the photography was enhanced by the smoothness of the ride.

I was too young to travel on the original steam-hauled Bristolian in its pseudo-GWR finery, but Tim’s photos have brought back happy memories of being aboard the recreated up Bristolian in 2010 behind 5043, when we were given the main line all the way. And there I was, window hanging from Tilehurst to see whether we would be allowed to run non-stop through the old Reading station, whistle blowing. My joy on seeing a string of green signals stretching all the way ahead was matched only by the run through the station itself, with an HST in the process of being diverted onto the relief line so that our Castle-hauled express could surge past and ahead. We ran parallel with that HST all the way to Slough before leaving it behind. Thank you Brian and Tim for bringing those memories alive again.