Saundersfoot Historical Society Display

[RJS1977]

Saw a rather splendid display of historical items on display at Saundersfoot Methodist Church today put on by the Historical Society. About 24' of the display was given over to displays and artefacts of the Saundersfoot Railway, including 2 rather nice static dioramas (t-scale approx) of the railway systems at Saundersfoot Harbour and Bonville's Court Colliery and the Works Plate off "Rosalind".

 

The exhibition's on until Friday and admission is a pound.

 

Unfortunately I had neither my camera nor my phone with me or I would have posted pictures.

[Ramblin Rich]

Shame you couldn't get some views. For those who don't know, the Saundersfoot railway ran inland from the harbour to various small collieries and works and was built to 4ft guage, originally with horse haulage. There was an incline on one line, steet running through Saundersfoot & one tunnel under the Pembroke Railway (GWR branch) which was only around 6ft high. When loco haulage was introduced, the 2 separate levels effectively had one loco each, with a very stumpy 0-4-0 ST called "Bull Dog" built to run through the tunnel - it made the Port of Par "Alfred" & "Judy" seem like giants! Bit of history and diagram of Bull Dog

I've been interested in this railway since childhood holidays in nearby Amroth, we used to walk over the cliffs to Wisemans Bridge & then along to old railway route including the tunnels to Saundersfoot. Later when I found some more history I traced the line back up the valley to Stepaside (before that big bypass road filled the valley ). Several buildings were still visible, but we are talking around 25 years ago now...

I also saw someone at a local show had built models of "Bull Dog" and "Rosalind" to 4mm scale, for once OO track guage was near correct!

[RJS1977]

Rich

 

Much of the trackbed is still walkable - I walked it from Saundersfoot Station to Stepaside at Easter (there are even still some sleepers visible in places) - see here:

 

http://s1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj563/RJS1977/Facebook/Saundersfoot%20Railway/

 

The trackbed northwards from Begelly is also still walkable (the footpath has recently been upgraded) and is visble from my parents' kitchen window!

 

I've also been intrigued by the possibilites of modelling the line in 00 but haven't done anything about it (yet!). RM published drawings of "Rosalind" in the 1970s with the note "Good luck to anyone attempting a model in anything less than 7mm scale!". Since then, the availability of Tenshodos would make such a model much easier.

 

Would have liked to have seen the models you mentioned!

 

Richard

[Ramblin Rich]

Hi Richard - good to see those images & that so much is still in place at Stepaside, the route from Wisemans Bridge has been tidied up a lot since I was last there! I quite enjoyed tracing the routes around the area, there was also an incline kickback up the south-west side of the valley which still shows up on OS maps, which had a capped shaft and an impressive engine house in situ.

I really can't remember much about the models in question, it was a long time ago

[RJS1977]

Yes, the Wiseman's Bridge-Stepaside route was turned into a cycle path by Sustrans a few years ago.

 

The capped shaft at the top of the kickback incline (Grove Colliery) can still be found and appears on Google satellite views.

 

As alluded to in the captions, there was anabrotive attempt to re-open Stepasie to Wiseman's Bridge as a miniature railway in the early 90s - the LRO is still in force! It's also open to interpretation as to whether or not the original Saundersfoot Railway Act is still in effect as the line was evidently dismantled in the wartime scrap drive without all the legal niceties being gone into....