Freight Train Formation

[MDP78]

 

 

 

I originally posted this in Modelling Questions but it was suggested here might be more appropriate. 

 

I have a copy of a Working Time Table for the Oswestry District for 15 June to 13 September 1959 which I downloaded from the Michael Clemens Railways website some time ago.  My interest is in traffic between Whichurch and Welshpool.  

 

Excluding Wrexham to Oswestry freights, which reverse at Ellesmere, in Down direction there were two daily Class H freights.  An AM Whitchurch to Oswestry, which shunted at Ellesmere for nearly 2 hours, and an early PM Whitchurch to Ellesmere.  In the Up direction (again excluding Wrexham bound traffic)  there are two Class H, a very early morning and another AM freight, both Oswestry to Whitchurch.    I am reasonably confident that the Class H trains would have been an assortment of wagons and vans, based on photographs I have seen.

 

There are two other Up freights that I am less sure about.  There was a 6.55pm WO Oswestry to Whitchurch Class D listed in the timetable as 'Livestock'.  There was also a 7.45pm WX Class F listed as 'To LMR Empties'.  Taking the latter first:

 

1.  Does anyone have any insight as to what 'Empties' means in this context.  Was it 'Empty' as in a working that effectively balances the AM Whitchurch to Oswestry class H and was simply returning empty wagons to the LMR?  Or was this likely to be a train primarily consisting of a number of a particular type of empty wagon?

 

2.  For the WO Class D, I am able to make a reasonably well educated guess that this train included a number of livestock wagons.  Being from Oswestry (although being born sometime after this line closed), I know that Wednesdays is market day in Oswestry, so I assume the train conveyed live animals from Oswestry to somewhere beyond Whitchurch.  What I am less sure about is whether this train would have been made up entirely of livestock wagons or whether this train would have also been made up of livestock wagons plus the the stock that would otherwise have made up the 7.45pm 'Empties' on the other days of the week?

 

Apologies in advance for my lack of knowledge in respect of WTT terminology.  

 

[The Stationmaster]

The Cambrian Lines area had the unfortunate habit of 'making' a lot of empties for the very simple reason that that was nothing like enough outwards traffic to balance the flow of inwards traffic.  If there was a train specifically noted in the WTT as 'empties' it would more than likely reflect one of the main flows for empty wagons back out of the area to spmewhere where there was a steady demand for empties.

 

Difficult to say what the predominant wagons would be - probably most likely to be 'general goods ' vehicles rather than coal empties but even coal empties could be moved in what might sometimes seem illogical directions.  There would also be a sprinkling, as traffic demanded of the more specialised sorts of wagon such as bogie bolsters (not many).  By the early part of the 1960s vans were really dominating general goods traffic although there was still regular use of opens for some traffics and I think they are probably the most likely types.  Don't forget though taht even if the train is titled 'empties' it could just as readily have conveyed loaded vehicles - all depends on what the Marshalling Instructions laid down.

 

By 1959 I doubt much of a train of exclusively livestock vehicles would have come out of Oswestry.  Don't forget/overlook the fact that the way freights were titled by that date was more likely reflecting something which had been in the WTT for years previously and had been much changed in the general freight traffic holocaust which resulted from the 1955 ASLE&F strike.  And looking in the September 1938 STT I duly found a 4.00pm WO Class C train from Oswestry to Whitchurch titled 'Livestock'; what was Class C in 1938 would be Class D in 1958  

[MDP78]

Thanks for taking the time to reply!

 

As it turns out I currently only have 3 wagons on my layout (loosely based on this route). I now feel I can justify running them in a train of general goods wagons!

[Aire Head]

49 minutes ago, MDP78 said:

Thanks for taking the time to reply!

 

As it turns out I currently only have 3 wagons on my layout (loosely based on this route). I now feel I can justify running them in a train of general goods wagons!

 

Are you referring to 3 cattle wagons?

 

If so don't forget when loaded they need to be shunted behind the Locomotive 

[The Stationmaster]

14 hours ago, Aire Head said:

 

Are you referring to 3 cattle wagons?

 

If so don't forget when loaded they need to be shunted behind the Locomotive 

No - 'to be marshalled in such a way as to require the minimum amount of shunting' 

[MDP78]

Sorry yes I currently only have 3 cattle wagons!!