Planes? Trains! Saturday 18th, Battle of Britain Locomotive London – Lowestoft…

Better than thar bulldozer 340 I last saw you driving I suppose

Well – not exactly a locomotive, but a nice bit of 1920s technology anyway… you certainly know about it when you’ve driven 140 miles in a day on it 😉

Lucky man. I’ve no interest in taking their numbers, but to drive a Locomotive. Mmmm.

That surprised me, I didn’t know any A4s had fled the country. Was it permanent or just visiting?

It was shipped out there on being withdrawn from BR Service, along with part of Eisenhower’s command train.

I must now finish getting this coal dust out of my fingers – I’ve been driving a steam wagon since thursday 😉

Dominion of Canada (60010) is in the Canadian Railroad History Museum, too.

Let’s keep this thread going a bit longer – saw this at Green Bay, Wisconsin while on my 2003 Oshkosh visit. I was surprised, to say the least! I’d last seen her in service at Kings Cross when I was about 15 years old!

That surprised me, I didn’t know any A4s had fled the country. Was it permanent or just visiting?

No arrival yet Rob – delayed by a day already…..it was due around the same time as this train as it happens.

A4 Pacific Dwight D Eisenhower

Let’s keep this thread going a bit longer – saw this at Green Bay, Wisconsin while on my 2003 Oshkosh visit. I was surprised, to say the least! I’d last seen her in service at Kings Cross when I was about 15 years old!

Indeed. If you’ve not ridden in a steam hauled train, you’ve not lived. If you also not raced the 4-6-0s in Victoria, Aus in the 1960s in the back for your parent’s VW Beetle, you’ve missed out, but that’s personal I feel. Thanks for the insign Snapper!

Cheers,

🙂 Many thanks for posting the photos, even the “tender first” ones!

Nah, they just did it to **** me off and wreck my photos.

Thanks for posting the photos Snapper.

Interesting to see tender first running again….I thought this was a big no,no on the Big Railway…only seen on heritage preserved lines operating under light railway orders….??

On the previous run to Skegness…the orignal thought was that it was to be Diesel hauled from Sleaford to Skegness to save the need for tender first running…but as in your photos Tangmere hauled the train tender first to Skeggy….

Clive.

Thanks, Snapper, you’ve reminded me how many hours I wasted in the rain standing by the East Coast main line hoping to see a “streak” (Gresley A4 Pacific for those old enough to remember) go by after I’d cycled the 15 miles from Lincoln to Newark.

Attached photographs of the 1950’s Battle of Britain Class Locomotive ‘Tangmere’ steaming under the Haddiscoe New Cut bridge and through Beccles Railway Station on Saturday 18th September 2004.

Approximately 60 people were present at Beccles in heavy rain to watch it pass – railway buffs, photographers, schoolchildren and people who’d heard mention on the radio / local press or by word of mouth. Some had travelled from Colchester and Romford to see the train in various areas. Snapper, Mrs Snapper, Whippersnapper and Duetodaysnapper travelled from between 2 and 6 miles away, the first time only Snapper staying through the delay before hitching across the marshes in less than 10 passing cars. The second time, with the light levels dropping to 1/90 at F3.5 at iso 800 (ie ****ty conditions!)in damn-near horizontal rain all three and a half Snappers were there. Two year old Whippersnapper, who’s never seen one either, was most raucous – “wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee” on appearance to arriving underneath with clouds of rather pleasant steam, followed by the most amusing “Encore” (‘again’)as it trundled away into the distance. Thus a soaked Snapper – in Stranglers t-shirt – buggered off glad that he wasn’t a spotter and that he didn’t have this as a hobby, but also pleased to have gone to see and enjoy it (as he will again), Regrettably he didn’t get any static shots at Lowestoft as somebody passing by dropped in completely unexpectedly and asked if he wanted to sell his old Mini, thus delaying him for an hour, making him part with his beloved wreck (that was in two magazines and went to Spain twice), and burning the forgotten about Salami and Shropshire Blue rolls warming in the oven. He also apologises if they images are too large for your screen, are too dark, too light or generally crap – he’s uploading from mum’s PC, the pc and the connection are powered by coal (coincidence) and he’s going spare after all this, Oh to be back home…..

It left from London Liverpool Street, was held up at Colchester and arrived at Norwich. From Norwich it left for Lowestoft (crossing under Haddiscoe bridge 50 minutes late) and from there to London via the East Suffolk line (and Beccles 40 minutes late). Next time someone tells me the trains ran on time when they were a lad i’ll know they are lying.

g6hyf Nice photo. Yes, that Skeggy trip was the same day as I saw the train going back south thro Grantham. You’re right; it was a cold day and it wasn’t very sunny! Still, nice to see Tangmere, I had never seen this loco before and I have yet to make a visit to the place from which it gets its name, but a visit to Tangmere is on my wish list!

Here’s one from an earlier trip, 10-7-04, to Sunny Skeggy…’cept it wasn’t sunny !!

Clive.

O.V. Bulleid “Battle of Britain” class 4-6-2 34067 Tangmere, courtesy of RailPictures.net, just as I remember her (and many others of her class) when I was a small boy living at Horsham, Sussex and haunting Three Bridges station on the Brighton line. Happy days!

Locomotives named after aircraft & squadrons

What a great thread! vintage aircraft and locomotives too! Although a GWR afficionado myself (hence my user name – spent much of my spare time at Toddington,Glos at the Railway!) I have always liked Oliver Bulleid’s air smoothed casings (it wasn’t streamlining as such, the locos were designed to go through carriage washing plants) although they were a pest to work on and, as an earlier poster has said, all 30 “Merchant Navy” class and several of the slightly smaller Battle of Britain and West Country classes were rebuilt to a more “standard” design in the 1950s. How the Southern Railway got away with building these 4-6-2 (pacifics) during WW2 has never really been answered, as everyone else was building 2-8-0s and other freight classes for the war effort.
The GWR was the 1st of the “Big Four” railway companies to name locomotives after WW2 aircraft during 1940-41, renaming 12 “Castle” Class 4-6-0 locomotives as follows: 5071 Spitfire, 5072 Hurricane, 5073 Blenheim, 5074 Hampden, 5075, Wellington, 5076 Gladiator, 5077 Fairey Battle, 5078 Beaufort, 5079 Lysander, 5080 Defiant, 5081 Lockheed Hudson, 5082 Swordfish. Of these, only 1 survives today, thanks to Barry Scrapyard in S Wales and that is 5080 – Defiant. It normally lives at the Bham Railway Museum at Tyseley and visited Toddington about 14 years ago.
Several Bulleid Battle of Britain Class (and West Country) locos also ended up in the same yard and also survived to be restored. Those that can be seen today are: 34051 Winston Churchill, 34053 Sir Keith Park, 34058 Sir Frederick Pile, 34059 Sir Archibald Sinclair, 34067 Tangmere (This came through my home town on the ECML at speed a few months back, awesome) 34072 257 Sqn, 34073 249 Sqn, 34081 92 Sqn. The Bof B class have very attractive nameplates, a metal scroll style name with an oval coat of arms (as in Winston Churchill) or Sqn badge (as with 92 Sqn). As you might expect, many of the original nameplates survive and they fetch in excess of £30K at auction! We bought our ex GWR steam locomotive (a 2-8-0) from Barry Scrapyard in 1980 for around £8K but it isn’t yet in working order! Sometime soon perhaps!

When it’s a railway engine!
Hi James, I am well into my captions for the Canada trip photos and hope to complete them over the weekend. In the meantime you can see a few on my Brandon Museum thread. (I know, this should be a PM but I took the opportunity here).
Peter

So when’s a locomotive an engine?