Castle Aching

[BlueLightning]

It might have been more accurate to have said that it had been my intention to make toast.

 

In fact, I did not get so far as to introduce bread to the grill.  I left the grill elements to heat up, neglecting to remove a grill pan, which, it turned out was full of fat, which ignited.  The rest of the oven interior then caught.

 

By the time I arrived en scène things had gone too far for damp cloth smothering, or turning off the grill, to avail me, and closing the oven door failed to starve the conflagration of oxygen.  

 

It was thus very gingerly that I removed the blazing grill pan from the oven and, careful to avoid torching the house on my route outside, eventually extinguished it by overturning it on the lawn.  I am sure the grass will grow back eventually. 

 

I think I am entitle to a Numpty of the Week award for this episode. 

 

And so, to work .... 

 

At least it wasn't too serious. My misses did something similar with her cooker when she lived in her old flat, she was attempting to roast a chicken, however she went out while it was on!

 

She was alerted to what had happened when her neighbour phoned to say the flat was well alight and the fire brigade had broken in to put it out.

 

I now "jokingly" keep a fire extinguisher out when she is cooking.

 

Gary

[Edwardian]

 

I now "jokingly" keep a fire extinguisher out when she is cooking.

 

 

 

That's brave!

[phil_sutters]

All this Royal Train diversion caused me to return to the idea of depicting the Yeomanry.  We have, as you know, one Yeomanry Officer extant. Ultimately I would love to model the Yeomanry on exercise.  Either a patrol or in the station yard loading cattle trucks and horse boxes in order to go off to Annual Camp by train.

 

 

Until now I had not considered representing the ceremonial function.  Inspired by the possibility of a Royal visit, a had a little Google an identified a second-hand volume on the Yeomanry units of Norfolk for a princely £1.98, so I have ordered it.  I should be able to post some more detail on the uniforms once this arrives.

 

This series might provide some appropriate 20mm figures for Yeomanry, if they are not too late. Otherwise you may have to look in colonial ranges.

http://lancerminiatures.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=86_87&products_id=849

They look nicely sculpted. 

[Edwardian]

All this Royal Train diversion caused me to return to the idea of depicting the Yeomanry.  We have, as you know, one Yeomanry Officer extant. Ultimately I would love to model the Yeomanry on exercise.  Either a patrol or in the station yard loading cattle trucks and horse boxes in order to go off to Annual Camp by train.

 

 

Until now I had not considered representing the ceremonial function.  Inspired by the possibility of a Royal visit, a had a little Google an identified a second-hand volume on the Yeomanry units of Norfolk for a princely £1.98, so I have ordered it.  I should be able to post some more detail on the uniforms once this arrives.

 

This series might provide some appropriate 20mm figures for Yeomanry, if they are not too late. Otherwise you may have to look in colonial ranges.

http://lancerminiatures.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=86_87&products_id=849

They look nicely sculpted. 

 

They do look good. I like Lancer Miniatures, though may have overlooked these as I think the Early War range might be relatively new/still expanding, and I am not up to date in such matters, so that was helpful. 

 

Of course, as we know, the transition from the Victorian colour to dark, as opposed to Indian, khaki took place during the Edwardian period.  If cavalry in khaki service dress is required, the W^D Models figures are 1/76 and particularly refined:  http://www.wdmodels.com/page3.htm

 

HaT Industrie provide them in 1/72nd plastic.

 

I could fill whole pages here (and doubtless will) with pictures of the Yeomanry of the period, but suffice it to say that we are looking at a period of transition from Victorian dress, via the influences of Imperial Yeomanry service in South Africa, but in the main still blue.  Post 1890s we are looking at the peaked cap rather than the pill box hat, though the Yeomanry wore this later than the Regulars, of course, I suspect 1905 might be a bit late.  Slouch hats were worn by ex-Imperial Yeoman.  Mostly still blue tunics, though.

 

Pictures from the W^D Models and HaT Industrie sites.

[Donw]

It is very unwise to leave a tray full of fat in an oven or under a grill for the simple reason should a knob get accidentally turned  there can be trouble. However if it was your other half who left it there I would not advise pointing it out to her rule 1 applies . No not it my railway. Rule 1 is that it will always be the man's fault. We rejected getting a touch control hob or oven. Mrs has enough trouble with her computer which takes any mouse hesitation as a mouse click. I dread to think what would happen in the kitchen with touch controls.

Actually if you have children that is a very good reason not to leave things in the oven.

As a thought would it be covered by your house insurance? or would you lose more in higher premiums at renewal?

 

Don

[Edwardian]

The oven works.  It will need replacing at some point, but hopefully at a more financially convenient moment.  If we sell our house, quite a lot becomes financially convenient!

 

Frankly, I have been more concerned at monitoring the Son & Heir's concussion after a rugby boot in the head.  He is, we are fairly certain, absolutely fine, but neither the school nor the medicos take any chances these days and its a month off from contact sports to the Boy's intense chagrin.

 

Not to mention best part of a grand to get the car through its MoT and a number of more minor irritations.

 

The dogs knocking a full glass of water over me in bed this morning came as something like comic relief.

 

I've had better weeks!

[webbcompound]

Edwardian said "All this Royal Train diversion caused me to return to the idea of depicting the Yeomanry.  We have, as you know, one Yeomanry Officer extant. Ultimately I would love to model the Yeomanry on exercise.  Either a patrol or in the station yard loading cattle trucks and horse boxes in order to go off to Annual Camp by train.

 

Until now I had not considered representing the ceremonial function.  Inspired by the possibility of a Royal visit, a had a little Google an identified a second-hand volume on the Yeomanry units of Norfolk for a princely £1.98, so I have ordered it.  I should be able to post some more detail on the uniforms once this arrives."

 

 

 

You might find these from W^D Models useful. The uniforms had not changed since WW1 (some LOC troops in France in 1939 were still in tunics, not battledress) They are supposed to be 4mm:1foot so should be exactly right. They are also excellent mouldings http://www.wdmodels.com/page3.htm#wd29

Edited January 28, 2017 by webbcompound

[Edwardian]

 

All this Royal Train diversion caused me to return to the idea of depicting the Yeomanry.  We have, as you know, one Yeomanry Officer extant. Ultimately I would love to model the Yeomanry on exercise.  Either a patrol or in the station yard loading cattle trucks and horse boxes in order to go off to Annual Camp by train.

 

Until now I had not considered representing the ceremonial function.  Inspired by the possibility of a Royal visit, a had a little Google an identified a second-hand volume on the Yeomanry units of Norfolk for a princely £1.98, so I have ordered it.  I should be able to post some more detail on the uniforms once this arrives.

 

 

 

You might find these from W^D Models useful. The uniforms had not changed since WW1 (some LOC troops in France in 1939 were still in tunics, not battledress) They are supposed to be 4mm:1foot so should be exactly right. They are also excellent mouldings http://www.wdmodels.com/page3.htm#wd29

 

 

Ah, two minds with but a single thought!

 

They would indeed be perfect.  Thanks.

Edited January 28, 2017 by Edwardian

[runs as required]

This series might provide some appropriate 20mm figures for Yeomanry, if they are not too late. Otherwise you may have to look in colonial ranges.

http://lancerminiatures.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=86_87&products_id=849

They look nicely sculpted.

 

'Colonial ranges' really sounds exciting

The heyday of my professional career was getting educational projects built in up-country Tanzania.

Tabora was a fascinating place - a remote railway town (with an ex Horwich resident engineer, big Ken, who had his own crate of Manx breakfast kippers kept in the frig of the Station Hotel)

The town was laid out to be the future capital of Deutsches Ost Afrika but apart from the Rheinland station and associated bizarre Bavarian Palace Hotel, only the mango trees planted along the proposed boulevards survive of the Grand Plan - amidst the haphazard subsistence 'shambas'

Count Von Lettow- Worbeck was the only WW1 General not to surrender and the ghosts of that devilish E Africa guerilla campaign seemed to lurk across that Savannah landscape I was doing my best to develop.

dh

[Edwardian]

'Colonial ranges' really sounds exciting

The heyday of my professional career was getting educational projects built in up-country Tanzania.

Tabora was a fascinating place - a remote railway town (with an ex Horwich resident engineer, big Ken, who had his own crate of Manx breakfast kippers kept in the frig of the Station Hotel)

The town was laid out to be the future capital of Deutsches Ost Afrika but apart from the Rheinland station and associated bizarre Bavarian Palace Hotel, only the mango trees planted along the proposed boulevards survive of the Grand Plan - amidst the haphazard subsistence 'shambas'

Count Von Lettow- Worbeck was the only WW1 General not to surrender and the ghosts of that devilish E Africa guerilla campaign seemed to lurk across that Savannah landscape I was doing my best to develop.

dh

 

Fascinating, and, of course, you are aware of the Memsahib's East African antecedents.

 

You can re-fight the fascinating East African campaign with various figure ranges, including the cost-effective HaT Industrie plastics.  There is nothing for the King's African Rifles, however.

[Caley Jim]

That Break van has a certain charm. Do you need the top lamp irons (has the WNR got any double track with goods loops)? I particularly like the ducket shape.

Sorry to drag this thread back screaming and kicking (and also to resurrect an old subject which to I meant to reply at the time - Santa failed once again to bring any round tuits  ), but distinguishing trains on loops was a secondary purpose of side lamps.  Their main purpose was to indicate to the loco crew that the train was complete.  Fractured couplings were not uncommon.  This could happen if the coupling got a jerk e.g. when starting up an incline immediately after descending one (not a problem on the WNR I would imagine), or when starting away after a signal check or slowing to collect a tablet.

 

Jim

[Edwardian]

This is worth a read (and there is even a picture featuring a railway carriage (at Usambara): http://www.allworldwars.com/My-Reminiscences-of-East-Africa-by-von-Lettow-Vorbeck.html

[Nearholmer]

I know nothing of military matters, but there was a 750mm gauge railway from usambara [nope, I got that wrong, it was from tengeni, on the railway to usambara] up into the forests, to collect timber, that was famous for insane gradients and curves, the sigibahn, which was some sort of German colonial enterprise ..... I can't find any web sources in English, but there are a few bits in German.

 

This site has zillions of German colonial snippets http://www.ub.bildarchiv-dkg.uni-frankfurt.de/Bildprojekt/Lexikon/Standardframeseite.php

 

Some of the locos were Mallets, said to have closely resembled the one preserved in this country at Statfold http://www.statfoldbarnrailway.co.uk/locomotives_Mallet.php ........ only one Mallet, according to the German equivalent of this forum, the remaining 46 locos being typical 0-6-0T and 0-4-0T.

 

K (Er ..... guilt-trip now underway ....... this hasn't really got a lot to do with rural Norfolk, has it? Sorry! Allowing my interest in feldbahnen to takeover.]

 

Photo of trains and passengers at the junction, and the Mallet.

Edited January 28, 2017 by Nearholmer

[Compound2632]

This is worth a read (and there is even a picture featuring a railway carriage (at Usambara): http://www.allworldwars.com/My-Reminiscences-of-East-Africa-by-von-Lettow-Vorbeck.html

 

The Count's Adjutant (is he named anywhere?) seems to have been quite a remarkable artist in the Jugendstil style.

[Nearholmer]

Continuing to ramble far OT ....... a song to go with the German Colonial excursion https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xVxvYsBq7GI

 

Or, this version http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CzICnqh8Rv4 which I suspect will cause yet another excursion down a weed-grown branch line.

 

The connection might not be immediately obvious, but the original was German, and if you listen carefully to the lyrics, it is all about going to serve in the colonies (having been spurned in love), and I imagine one of the chaps in topis to be humming it under his breath.

 

I promise to stop now!

 

K

Edited January 28, 2017 by Nearholmer

[phil_sutters]

All this Royal Train diversion caused me to return to the idea of depicting the Yeomanry.  We have, as you know, one Yeomanry Officer extant. Ultimately I would love to model the Yeomanry on exercise.  Either a patrol or in the station yard loading cattle trucks and horse boxes in order to go off to Annual Camp by train.

 

By chance I have scanned this photo from my grandfather's copy of Kitchener's Army - a typically jingoistic book, produced I assume in the first year or two of WW1 - about the training of the volunteer army, which followed the Old Contemptibles and included Yeomanry regiments. I say by chance as there is another thread about horseboxes for which this was scanned.

Edited January 29, 2017 by phil_sutters

[Donw]

That picture set me off reminiscing about Harry Gwilliam who spent WW1 breaking in and training new horses for Officers. Not something he was happy about caring more for the horses than the officers but the alternative was probably the trenches. Best stop now as I will go way off topic. The Army did require a lot of horses.

 

Don

[Northroader]

Now that we've beaten that damned Kaiser Bill, it's time to get our boys back home to dear old Norfolk, don't you know? What better way than on the Uganda Railway, built by Britain, eh? It's the one that blighter Von Lettow Warbeck was trying to blow up, damned scoundrel. Here's some shots of a model I took on the old Kodak oojymaflip at Manchester show in '97. It's made by Mr Derek Williams, obviously a very gifted chappie. Now have a look at the scale, 10mm to a foot, and 32mm gauge, proper sizes, I'd say, good old solid look about that, what? Those tinplate fellows with garden Railways can tell you all about that. There's even a blasted elephant at the back!

[corneliuslundie]

Before this thread returns to something remotely connected with the railway of Norfolk, can i recommend a book: The flame trees of Thika" by Elsbeth Huxley (Vintage Books, 2014). It is the memoirs of a young girl growing up in east Africa shortly before and during the start of the First World War. There are even a few mntions of the local railways. A fascinating glimpse of a completely different world. (She became part of the Huxley clan by marriage.) I had never heard of the book but apparently when published it was a best seller and had a TV series based on it.

Jonathan

[Edwardian]

Before this thread returns to something remotely connected with the railway of Norfolk, can i recommend a book: The flame trees of Thika" by Elsbeth Huxley (Vintage Books, 2014). It is the memoirs of a young girl growing up in east Africa shortly before and during the start of the First World War. There are even a few mntions of the local railways. A fascinating glimpse of a completely different world. (She became part of the Huxley clan by marriage.) I had never heard of the book but apparently when published it was a best seller and had a TV series based on it.

Jonathan

 

Contributors might also recall a TV adaption of same.

 

The Memsahib was in that.  Specifically when the girl is riding (and falling off), that's my wife!

 

All the ex pats seem to have chipped in to provide horses, vehicles, extras etc for the production.

[Donw]

I may as well carried on with my reminiscence of Harry Gwilliam we have wandered afar.

However 10mm to the foot is a good scale for 3ft and metre gauge stuff rather overshadowed by G gauge stuff these days

Don

[runs as required]

I may as well carried on with my reminiscence of Harry Gwilliam we have wandered afar.

However 10mm to the foot is a good scale for 3ft and metre gauge stuff rather overshadowed by G gauge stuff these days

Don

Trying to nudge back towards topic - were you to build the railway at 10mm to 1 foot, you could have Castle Aching as a half scale 'model village' 'Visitor Attraction' sited adjacent to the terminus.

:-)

dh

[runs as required]

Erm....

I'm editing a double posting because I'm using Madam's iPad

Thanks for your indulgence over straying into African railways. The Usambaras (see Kevin's light railway post above) was the location for a German Technical research station tasked with discovering what might be profitable extractive exports from the Colony.

It is still a very relaxing 'hill station' retreat for a weekend away from the humid coast.

dh

Edited January 29, 2017 by runs as required

[Nearholmer]

Interesting idea. There a few layouts on the exhibition circuit which go the other way, and use large scale trains to represent miniatures, notably the RHDR. I thought this was a recent idea, until I found the below.

[Edwardian]

I know nothing of military matters, but there was a 750mm gauge railway from usambara [nope, I got that wrong, it was from tengeni, on the railway to usambara] up into the forests, to collect timber, that was famous for insane gradients and curves, the sigibahn, which was some sort of German colonial enterprise ..... I can't find any web sources in English, but there are a few bits in German.

 

This site has zillions of German colonial snippets http://www.ub.bildarchiv-dkg.uni-frankfurt.de/Bildprojekt/Lexikon/Standardframeseite.php

 

Some of the locos were Mallets, said to have closely resembled the one preserved in this country at Statfold http://www.statfoldbarnrailway.co.uk/locomotives_Mallet.php ........ only one Mallet, according to the German equivalent of this forum, the remaining 46 locos being typical 0-6-0T and 0-4-0T.

 

K (Er ..... guilt-trip now underway ....... this hasn't really got a lot to do with rural Norfolk, has it? Sorry! Allowing my interest in feldbahnen to takeover.]

 

Photo of trains and passengers at the junction, and the Mallet.

 

This is fascinating stuff, and those are great photographs.  I feel there is much, much more I want to know about the railways of German East Africa.

 

 

Continuing to ramble far OT ....... a song to go with the German Colonial excursion

 

Or, this version http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CzICnqh8Rv4 which I suspect will cause yet another excursion down a weed-grown branch line.

 

The connection might not be immediately obvious, but the original was German, and if you listen carefully to the lyrics, it is all about going to serve in the colonies (having been spurned in love), and I imagine one of the chaps in topis to be humming it under his breath.

 

I promise to stop now!

 

K

 

A drag-act based upon the archetypal Edwardian Maiden Aunt singing 1930s light operetta based upon a Nineteenth Century German play.  It makes one proud to be British!

 

Needless to say, great stuff!

 

 

Now that we've beaten that damned Kaiser Bill, it's time to get our boys back home to dear old Norfolk, don't you know? What better way than on the Uganda Railway, built by Britain, eh? It's the one that blighter Von Lettow Warbeck was trying to blow up, damned scoundrel. Here's some shots of a model I took on the old Kodak oojymaflip at Manchester show in '97. It's made by Mr Derek Williams, obviously a very gifted chappie. Now have a look at the scale, 10mm to a foot, and 32mm gauge, proper sizes, I'd say, good old solid look about that, what? Those tinplate fellows with garden Railways can tell you all about that. There's even a blasted elephant at the back!

IMG_0865.JPG

IMG_0866.JPG

 

Now we are back in the Memsahib's territory.  The building of the Cape to Cairo railway through East Africa always puts me in mind of the Lions of Tsavo.  I am sure I saw one of these in Leeds museum as a very small boy.  Fortunately, not being called "Albert" or possessing a stick with a horse's head handle, and said lion being stuffed, I survived the encounter with the fearsome man-eater.  For the Mem, however, they are the stuff of nightmares.

 

Which brings me to her forebears.  One built the Bodmin & Wadebridge and another, this time from the Anglo-Irish branch, was a distinguished engineer who, I think, was mainly involved in railways in the Far East and India, but who had some involvement with East African railway building as well. 

 

What a delightful model.  Pre-Grouping East African style, I suppose.  This I expect is the sort of thing that ran before bogie coaches and those giant red East African Railways Garretts that the Mem grew up with.  

 

So, plenty of relevance so far as I am concerned.

 

 

Erm....

I'm editing a double posting because I'm using Madam's iPad

Thanks for your indulgence over straying into African railways. The Usambaras (see Kevin's light railway post above) was the location for a German Technical research station tasked with discovering what might be profitable extractive exports from the Colony.

It is still a very relaxing 'hill station' retreat for a weekend away from the humid coast.

dh

 

Interesting.  The Lettow-Vorbeck Reminiscences includes the picture below of a train at Usambara.

 

 

Interesting idea. There a few layouts on the exhibition circuit which go the other way, and use large scale trains to represent miniatures, notably the RHDR. I thought this was a recent idea, until I found the below.

 

That is entirely charming.

Edited January 29, 2017 by Edwardian