Locomotives Of The Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway A Definitive Survey 1854 - 1966

[Not Jeremy]

A new book from Pen and Sword, which has just been placed into stock at the Titfield Thunderbolt Bookshop.

 

My take on it is here and I have to say I do have some reservations.

 

I would be interested to hear others thoughts, I reckon there's enough here to get a lively and good discussion/conversation going, as I am sure there will be many people who disagree with me.

 

Which could be a welcome alternative to threads about Covid infested traffic queues of unemployed drivers trying to leave the country, or were they trying to get in to the country? Oh its all too confusing, lets make a cup of tea and discuss the minutiae of Victorian locomotive design, idiotically long book titles, captions that send you to sleep, the colourisation of odd pictures and the vagaries of the English language instead, over to you...

 

And yes, the book is available from everyone else too!

 

Not Jeremy

[PenrithBeacon]

Yes, I have reservations too. The clue, which I missed, is in the subtitle. You simply cannot have a survey of 1854 to 1966 in one small volume.

Having said that, and ignoring the errors of omission and commission, it does have some useful additional information of the S&DR before joint ownership which I didn't know still survived. Whether that is worth the sale price is another matter. 

A missed opportunity. 

[Peter Kazmierczak]

It's hard to write a book, but sure easy to criticise one.
I popped into our local bookshop in Wimborne and saw a copy of this on the shelf; local connection I suppose, that's why they had a copy. Had a look through but left without buying, even though I had some book tokens in my wallet. Why? 
The title, unfortunately, doesn't live up to the contents. I'll just comment on the BR period, but I would have expected a full listing (with dates) of every loco allocated to S&DJt sheds - there wasn't one.
Definitive? No way I'm afraid.

[laurenceb]

Pen & Sword are becoming very disappointing, they seem to be pushing quantity over quality at a high price.

[asmay2002]

On 02/10/2021 at 15:52, Peter Kazmierczak said:

It's hard to write a book, but sure easy to criticise one.
I popped into our local bookshop in Wimborne and saw a copy of this on the shelf; local connection I suppose, that's why they had a copy. Had a look through but left without buying, even though I had some book tokens in my wallet. Why? 
The title, unfortunately, doesn't live up to the contents. I'll just comment on the BR period, but I would have expected a full listing (with dates) of every loco allocated to S&DJt sheds - there wasn't one.
Definitive? No way I'm afraid.

Not sure why you would expect a list of BR locomotive allocations when the book is about the SDJR, which ceased to exist 18 years before BR was born.  The SDJR locos went on after 1930 of course but anything else allocated to the line after 1930 is surely out of scope of the title as they were never SDJR locos.

 

[PenrithBeacon]

48 minutes ago, asmay2002 said:

Not sure why you would expect a list of BR locomotive allocations when the book is about the SDJR, which ceased to exist 18 years before BR was born.  The SDJR locos went on after 1930 of course but anything else allocated to the line after 1930 is surely out of scope of the title as they were never SDJR locos.

 

The subtitle is 'A Definitive Survey 1859 to 1966' so there's at least a good argument for loco allocation listings. Technically the SDJR continued as a legal entity until nationisation although the joint committee didn't own any locos and rolling stock after 1930.

Actually, I would agree that the scope of the book is too broad and it would have been better if the cut-off point was 1930. I think the author set himself a task he couldn't possibly have fulfilled, at least in one volume and perhaps not at all.

There are lots of books available for LSWR, SR, MR, LMS, GWR and BR locomotives so it would have been better to include a bibliography for those types. To be fair there is some crossover concerning MR/LMS locos before 1930, but that could be resolved easily. 

Edited October 8, 2021 by PenrithBeacon

[Peter Kazmierczak]

1 hour ago, asmay2002 said:

Not sure why you would expect a list of BR locomotive allocations when the book is about the SDJR, which ceased to exist 18 years before BR was born.  The SDJR locos went on after 1930 of course but anything else allocated to the line after 1930 is surely out of scope of the title as they were never SDJR locos.

 

 

In addition to David's well-considered comments above, then why did the author mention (with illustrations) any loco classes post 1930? Indeed, why the need for the date of 1966 in the sub-title at all?