Jump to content
 

L&SWR Livery question.


Recommended Posts

  • RMweb Gold

Which of these is most suitable for a 1920's layout. Would we have seen both running together?

 

Rob

post-14122-0-09834300-1442610393.jpeg

post-14122-0-43754400-1442610421_thumb.jpg

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

Hi Rob, no LSWR expert seems to have picked up on this question, so you'll have to make do with a GWR man  :)

 

I believe the top one is in Drummond livery (1895-1914), and the lower one is the Urie livery (the later 1917-1922 variant, I think). 

 

I've checked it myself once or twice as the LSWR keeps making aggressive bids for running rights into Farthing!

Link to post
Share on other sites

I believe that most if not all loco record cards survive at Kew, and livery change dates remain on record. Bradley certainly had access to them and summarised them to support his loco histories. Even so, without access to Kew, a bit of guess work is unavoidable.

 

Drummond liveries themselves varied with time, and at one early stage the great man used SWR instead of LSWR, and sometimes L&SWR. Almost certainly though, Urie would have put his own stamp on the fleet with minimal delay, and particularly after the end of the Kaiser War. I would be surprised if any Drummond liveries were still in existence in the 1920s.

 

Hth

 

PB

Link to post
Share on other sites

The Southern Style is a trifle ambiguous regarding the Urie colours. It would appear that examples of the Drummond livery survived until grouping, and the Hornby colour on 245 seems a good match for this colour in the HMRS colour chart. The change by Urie seems to have been slow, probably due to wartime conditions, and observers gave different accounts - generally olive, but also brownish, sickly, light, pale, yellow, yellowish, grey, dark, darkened and sage green. You pays your money and you takes your choice!

The HMRS Urie colour swatch is slightly greyer and yellower than the Drummond colour, but considerably darker than the colour used on the GBL T9, which seems to reflect the, I suspect, incorrect livery used on the preserved loco, much like the dreadful yellow on the Highland Jones Goods. The Hornby M7 looks slightly darker than that, and might work on the actual model, but the HMRS suggest that the colour used on the cover of the Wild Swan book on Urie Locos is a reasonable representation of the colour used, and that is also a much darker shade. Perhaps a heavy weathering, as Burgundy did on a Dapol Terrier, might bring its brightness down suitably.

Link to post
Share on other sites

The Urie livery was being applied until the 1923 grouping of the railways and so is the most applicable for an early 1920's layout. The colour is a straight black and yellow mix. I know because one of the transport paint suppliers to the railway companies recommended it to me many years ago and it works.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Another Great western man dips in.

 

First, anyone planning to do anything with the Southern Western should probably follow Mr Lundie's advice and procure a copy of the recent HMRS volume.  I confess that I haven't, but I fully intend to.

 

Second, I notice you asked about the survival of the earlier, Drummond, livery.  Would they have run side by side?

 

Well, I don't have the benefit of the latest learning represented by the HMRS volume, but, my understanding is that Urie took over in 1912, and, according to Nigel Digby, there were changes from December 1914 to "a softer, darker green" as a "base colour".  "Often called 'sage' green, it was in fact a light olive green".

 

The 1917 changes are said by Mr Digby to relate to the simplification of the lining, not to the shade of green; from 1917 you had the black and white edging shown in the right hand photograph. 

 

I confess I am confused by the suggestion that Urie's 'sage' green was somehow darker than the Drummond green, though the description "light olive green" seems to fit the right hand photograph.

 

Given that this new green was being applied to new locos and on repaints from 1914, I would imagine that the Drummond livery would have been well on the wane by the 1920s.  Period photos would seem to be the answer here, though how one identifies a 1914-1917 loco with Urie green and Drummond lining, I don't know.

 

I suspect the situation was even more complicated than this summary, so, I suspect the HMRS volume is a must.

Link to post
Share on other sites

As I said, the HMRS book doesn't, to my mind, resolve anything. The darker than Drummond green was a contemporary comment, not mine, and obviously slightly at odds with the others. There is the suggestion that Urie used the darker goods green on some of his larger classes, and the comment might refer to this. The book also suggests that the Urie green continued to be applied by the Southern until 1925!

If it helps, they continue:-

In your editor's mind it is entirely plausible that Urie would describe this colour as 'Sage Green'. Further, one can see why the Southern's Chairman thought it insipid. Compared with the Drummond green, it it more yellow, about the same in lightness/darkness but much less brilliant, I.e. more grey/dull. It is less yellow, slightly darker and more dull than the colour patch in the book.... Some commentators have stated there was very little change in the shade of green, from Adams to Urie, but the evidence that there was a yellowing of the shade iseems overwhelming.

How this applies to the Hornby version it is difficult to say without seeing one in the flesh and comparing it with the coloured items in the HMRS book.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Interesting.  Depending on the exact shade used, lighting etc, some renderings of Adam green do not look that far off Urie green, but to my mind the Adam green always appears more of a bluish green than Urie's/Urie's more of a yellowish green that Adam's.

 

The pictures I have seen depicting Drummond green seem close to Hornby's shade, and I am glad at the thought that Hornby's depiction is a reasonable one for this version.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...