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Hi Everyone

 

Please see here a batch of photos that I seek information about.

 

Photos Nos.7 and 8 are obviously GWR or BR(W) autocoach trains - but where and  when?

Photo 9 may well be the same. Plainly GWR or GWR origin - but again:  where and  when?

Photo 11 looks to me like a GWR  shed. Am I right?  In any case where and  when?

Photo 12 is  from the same batch (all these  had "16" pencilled on the back in the same hand) so I'm thinking it must be GWR / GWR origin - but again where  and when?

unknown 7.jpg

unknown 8.jpg

unknown 9.jpg

unknown 11.jpg

unknown 12.jpg

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1 hour ago, Tim V said:

12 could be Longdown.

It did cross my mind since we already have Heathfield at 8, is Longdown in more of a valley though? Edit - looking west is more open like that view.

By closure Longdown Signal Box was a brick structure. If so could this be before the 1943 re-modelling?

 

The Heathfield photo must be before June 1958 when passenger services over the Teign Valley line finished, and the Moretonhampstead photos before February 1959 ditto.

 

cheers

 

Edited by Rivercider
clarification
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Thanks to all who have  responded to this.

 

We seem to have put Nos.7, 8 and 9 to bed fairly conclusively: Mortonhampstead and on the Exeter to Moretonhampstead branch and Heathfield on the Teign Valley line.  These make total sense. Other photos from this job lot purchased at auction include Chudleigh Knighton and Perridge Tunnel both on the Teign Valley line - previously identified by Jeremy C and SD85 (see my  earlier topic "Unknown Locations").  Interestingly we concluded that these latter photos were taken from and autocoach.

 

Re: photo 11: Having  done  some  checking (now that I know  what/where I'm looking) I  think I  agree with Darryl Tooley.  The layout of the end of the  shed (entrance  and  windows) and also the location and design of the water  tower (incuding the clock on the  end) certainly look like the NER Leeds Neville Hill shed.

 

That leaves some mystery still surrounding photo 12.  The Teign Valley line sounds likely for the reasons stated above - so Longdown looks probable?

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  • RMweb Gold

Yes, Longdown fits for Photo 12. On this page, search for Longdown (it's near the bottom):

http://www.cornwallrailwaysociety.org.uk/teign-valley-branch.html

 

You will see a photo of Longdown Signal Box taken from the opposite angle. The building and the surrounding features seem to match up.

 

Edited by Harlequin
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  • 3 weeks later...
  • RMweb Gold

Ref as to when for No 9 at Moretonhampstead, that will be post 1937, the sliding doors on the engine shed are gone. I'm not sure what year they were removed but there are pics of it in 1937 with them still on.

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Note that in photo 12 the shadow in the bottom left hand corner matches that in the photograph of Chudleigh Knighton Halt. If you look at photo 8 above it shows the auto train in the Teign Valley platform at Heathfield, and in the corner of the left hand window of the auto coach some sort of handle can clearly be seen. I think that this is the shadow present in the aforementioned photographs.

 

Photo 8 is also taken facing north (i.e. in the Exeter direction) towards the point where the Teign Valley line diverges from the Moretonhampstead line after the signal box, which means the auto coach is facing south away from Exeter. Photo 12 and the one of Chudleigh Knighton Halt are both taken with the camera pointing in the Heathfield direction (i.e. away from Exeter). Referring back to the earlier query last year, I think the other two photographs (of the tunnel and the track section) were also taken with the camera pointing down the line towards Heathfield.

 

As mentioned earlier, the Teign Valley line diverges from the Moretonhampstead branch at Heathfield. The general theme of all the photographs I have discussed here is that they were taken on a sunny day in the 1950s (the photograph of Chudleigh Knighton shows that the platform had been replaced in concrete, which did not take place until after the war), and they all have a similar 'look' to them. It is not too unreasonable to assume therefore that all of these photographs were taken on the same journey. It is not clear which direction the journey was in as the photographs taken inside the auto coach could have been as the train was either arriving or departing the locations, but it seems that this was a summer trip which involved doing the Teign Valley line and changing at Heathfield (after photographing the train) before journeying up to Moretonhampstead, or vice versa.

 

A link on the Teign Valley line website (http://www.cornwallrailwaysociety.org.uk/teign-valley-branch.html) gives the following extract which may provide a clue to the photographer's identity:

 

A note from Edward Hooper Nephew  of Charles Fennamore.           

Charles Fennamore sadly passed away a year ago on 09 Nov 2018, a day after his 78th birthday.

Above is one of his photos of Longdown on the Teign valley Line. I would be grateful if you could share it on 9th November. (This was done)

Charles would have been the first to admit that it wouldn't win any prizes, but his memories of the line make for interesting reading:

"A lovely line, and easy on our pockets, because you could get a day return Ply to Exeter, and they'd let you come back via the Teign Valley. I went on the last train, which was a very sad occasion......the 55XX labouring away up to Longdown with 5 or 6 coaches. On our first trip, it was a 14XX plus 2 car auto, with the loco in the rear, and the driver in the front vestibule left his door open so that we could see the line ahead."

 

Charles Fennamore's photograph of Longdown station (looking towards Exeter) is reproduced below; the general ambience of the print seems to match that of the other photographs. The photographs we have analysed were however probably not taken on the trip described in the extract above as the one of the train at Heathfield clearly shows it to be a single auto coach.

 

 

 

Longdown - a photograph from the Charles Fennamore Collection. Copyright The Charles Fennamore Estate.

 

EDIT: Photo removed due to copyright etc., but if you go on the page I linked you'll find it.

Edited by SD85
Image removed - breach of copyright
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