steamers to the scrap yard

[The Stationmaster]

A photo from about Feb 1966.  4 locos, rods removed, are taken south by a Western.

 

sca021.jpg

 

Dave

Oxford was one of the London Division sheds which seems to have acted as a concentration centre for stored/withdrawn engines (Didcot was another) as the Division was dieselised.

[bike2steam]

Yeah, and such a sod to get round without being slung out !!! With all it's space, out the back, Southall shed had a big collection of condemned locos - especially just before, and after OOC's closure to steam in early 65.

[unravelled]

As I lived in Walton Well Rd, it was easy to get into Oxford shed without hassle. I was a regular trespasser there in my teens. But I don't think I'd ever ventured as close to the main lines past the shed as I did for that photo!

One Sunday a bunch of us went there and cleaned one side of Burton Agnes Hall (the side away fron the main lines, to avoid being noticed).

 

I can't say I noticed any sudden build up of locos before the end of steam, so they may well have worked there as opportunity arose. They seemed to have a good number in steam on the 31st as the midnight whistling was impressive. After then the rods were cut, and a few at a time the locos were removed. One unusual incident at that time was seeing some publicity/cover shots being taken for some pop group. I never did  find out which.

 

A few steam locos turned up (and round) after the end of steam there, not just the York/ Bournmouths and return.

 

Dave

[bike2steam]

 

A few steam locos turned up (and round) after the end of steam there, not just the York/ Bournmouths and return.

 

Dave

 LMR to SR steam hauled inter-regional trains continued, very much to the Western Regions annoyance, but not long before Oxford shed closed, loco changing was transferred to Banbury, which had been LMR territory for three years. 

[Pacific231G]

Yeah, and such a sod to get round without being slung out !!! With all it's space, out the back, Southall shed had a big collection of condemned locos - especially just before, and after OOC's closure to steam in early 65.

Some (or possibly one) of the shedmasters at 81F were prepared to let us in; if not we sometimes managed to sneak in anyway and occasionally got "asked to leave" (aka slung out). We were always polite though so I guess that helped.

 

I also don't remember any great build up of locos on the scrap line. I always assumed those that were there were 81F locos though not being a spotter I wouldn't have known shed allocations; they did seem to be the same classes that had worked there.

 

Unfortunately my parents moved from Oxford while I was at Uni and my mum threw out all my photos; some of them weren't bad.

[stewartingram]

Point of pedantic order on this thread though - isn't a "steamer" a vessel that travels on the water?

(Pedant mode off)

 

Stewart

[mow]

I remember seeing large numbers of withdrawn locomotives in or near Glasgow, but I've real idea where it was. 

[EddieB]

I agree. The number 11 was part of a sentence I thought I'd edited out because I didn't believe it either. I've changed my post to lose that number. I'd actually be surprised if the real number of SG industrials is not well into three figures. The number of "foreign" locos in the list was rather low as well as it didn't seem to extend beyond seven ex USATC types. I'm sure the Nene Valley alone have several "foreign" locos.

One of the lists I found was here http://www.onlineweb.com/rail/locomotive_listing.htm which is on M J Smith's website but I've seen the same list elsewhere so I'm not sure who compiled it. It seems to be up to date to about 2010-2011 but I think was based on locos at known sites so may have missed some privately owned examples.

 

I don't know if it's even possible to compile a truy comprehensive list of ex main-line locos in Great Britain but the fact that 500 seemed to be an easily reached figure was very heartening as I'm sure the real total is quite a bit higher. While I doubt if there are private owners with a Castle or an A4 that nobody knows about, small tank locos are probably a different matter and as for narrow gauge the total is anyone's guess, would a thousand be over optimistic?

 

Trying to find out what remains in other countries is even harder but a fairly routine steam gala on a British preserved line can probably offer more main line locomotives than are available in the whole of a country like France. 

 

Not as hard as it might seem - depends if you know where to look.

 

Every three years the Industrial Railway Society publishes a new edition of their "Existing Locomotives" handbook.  The book lists all known locomotives in industrial service, preserved or set aside for preservation.  IRS members receive regular updates between editions.  The next edition is due later this year.

 

For France, I have a little book published by La Vie du Rail in the 'nineties.  Locations are out of date in many respects, but as a survey of French locomotives in preservation, it's the most comprehensive I've found.  The Platform 5 handbook series also lists preserved locomotives, but tends to concentrate on ex-main line ones.

 

The LCGB regularly issues booklets covering surviving locomotives in a particular country or group of countries.  These are updated and re-issued as and when (for example a new edition of Czech and Slovak is just being released).  Coverage depends upon availability of information and manageability - but are usually comprehensive.

 

For Spain, try the website created and maintained by the Director of the Asturias Railway Museum (Gijon): http://www.locomotoravapor.com/.  Another excellent web resource for Austria can be found here: http://www.dampflok.at/, with a link to a book published a few years ago (which, like all books, is slowly going out of date).

 

For Czech Republic and Slovakia, the editions of Maly Atlas list preserved locomotives in those countries.

[Reading General]

I have two experiences, both at Reading.......U class 31618 on it's way to Kent FROM the scrapyard and on two or three occasions, withdrawn 4LAV units hauled through marked as said above COND with circles with crosses in....  the only 4LAVs I ever saw. (they looked in pretty good nick to me too! As good or better than our usual 2BIL and 2HAL units

[unravelled]

 LMR to SR steam hauled inter-regional trains continued, very much to the Western Regions annoyance, but not long before Oxford shed closed, loco changing was transferred to Banbury, which had been LMR territory for three years. 

I took these  photos early in Jan 1966, after 6998 had headed the last steam from Oxford. I can't recollect what replaced it, but the 9F was certainly turned at the shed.

 

 

 

 

Dave

[phil_sutters]

I have just come across this sad scene from the Dorsetshire.com website

https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5533/14220620756_8d5e3b03e8_b.jpg

Edited February 20, 2016 by phil_sutters

[luckymucklebackit]

I see that Peter Hands has finally embraced the electronic age and has set up a website http://www.whathappenedtosteam.com/  Some interesting stuff on there.

 

Jim

[mightbe]

Armchair activities Research on flickr shows decommissioned locos stored in the goods yard at Hove before being sent on to the scrap yards. It seems that side rods etc were not immediately removed.

 

Here's a U1 in 1963:

 

 

From an excellent photoset by Ian Nolan: https://www.flickr.com/photos/31890193@N08/sets/72157635467172110/

 

Quentin

Edited March 16, 2016 by mightbe

[rockershovel]

It is an emotional subject, though. Why DO people show such affection for modelling things they never saw, or only saw at their very last gasp?

 

I can't find the attribution, but a quote which has stayed in my mind throughout life refers to the period from 1945 to 1967 (ie, tne end of the Second World War to the Wilson-era devaluation) as "the false dawn of the failed post-War revolution". Reading the paper only the other day, I noticed an article about how "the past 50 years of education reform have destroyed social mobility" and certainly, I don't believe the current concept of "left wing" would have been recognised by those who voted in tne 1945 Labour government.

 

I do get a strong impression that for a significant part of the post-War generation, the eclipse of steam acts as a metaphor for the failed promise of the period from the 1960s onwards.

[bike2steam]

So I must feel honoured to have actually seen what I model from the late 1950's/early 1960's, I thought I was so sad having kept my old spotting lists, and now only have model locos numbered as those I saw. But your right, very much a failed promise, but we have to make the best of it, and not sink into deep depression because of it. :-)

Edited March 16, 2016 by bike2steam

[TheSignalEngineer]

Sadly most of my spotting notes got lost in the course of various house moves by my parents and myself. Some photos do remain and the web has provided numerous photos linked to my regular spotting venues, e.g. www,warwickshirerailways.com also Flickr and various Facebook groups.

 

I too model my most active spotting period, which was from the late 1950s until I started work on BR in the mid 1960s. To give more focus the present layout is based in the West Midlands during the period after introduction of the late crest and before small yellow panels. 

 

The other part of my collection, and a possible planned layout, is based on memories of Cornwall and North Devon during those days of childhood holidays when you thought the world would go on for ever as it stood.

Giving your meat order to the Post Office in the morning and it being delivered by the bus conductor on the afternoon run from St Austell. Line fishing for mackrel with the local fishermen in small boats, being the only people on a mile-long beach in Cornwall on a July afternoon.................

Stuck for an hour waiting for an assisting engine or relief crew at Newton Abbott on a Summer Saturday, Up the bank to Morthoe behind a Spamcan with an M7 banking, Beattie Well Tanks, 1419 at Lostwithiel with the Fowey train, D600 ex-works on the Up CRE, Zs banking at Exeter, N and 43xx 2-6-0s double headed out of Ilfracombe on Stanier stock for Birmingham joined by the Minehead portion including Gresley teaks still with all of the LNER fittings inside at Taunton................................

[mightbe]

It is an emotional subject, though. Why DO people show such affection for modelling things they never saw, or only saw at their very last grasp?

I do get a strong impression that for a significant part of the post-War generation, the eclipse of steam acts as a metaphor for the failed promise of the period from the 1960s onwards.

Part of it for me is an attraction to dereliction; a once grand (or seemingly so) thing now almost unrecognizable. I never saw any of it of course, at least not in person. To borrow from a great quote, the nostalgia is our "polite agreement" with the past.

 

I suppose the British transition came at a vulnerable time, both to active modelers now and the British public at the time. Between two world wars and mass modernization efforts, the Victorian world and mindset was crumbling around them. It seems appropriate that steam should take its final bow at the same time, as a relic of a bygone era and bygone aspirations.

 

Quentin

[rockershovel]

Part of it for me is an attraction to dereliction; a once grand (or seemingly so) thing now almost unrecognizable. I never saw any of it of course, at least not in person. To borrow from a great quote, the nostalgia is our "polite agreement" with the past.

I suppose the British transition came at a vulnerable time, both to active modelers now and the British public at the time. Between two world wars and mass modernization efforts, the Victorian world and mindset was crumbling around them. It seems appropriate that steam should take its final bow at the same time, as a relic of a bygone era and bygone aspirations.

Quentin

I met a traveller from an antique land..... I'm intrigued that you have removed the main point of my original post, reversing its meaning; yet in some ways, we appear to be saying much the same thing.. Edited March 16, 2016 by rockershovel

[mightbe]

I met a traveller from an antique land..... I'm intrigued that you have removed the main point of my original post, reversing its meaning; yet in some ways, we appear to be saying much the same thing..

 

Apologies if I misunderstood or miswrote--I'd just woken up and was intrigued by what you'd said. I guess I sense that the prosperity and growth of the 1950s finally laid Victorian sensibilities--well past their sell-by date--to rest. Even though many promises didn't pan out, there was some sense that relics had to be let go of "in the name of progress". It's easy see how steam locomotives could've been considered 'everyday artifacts'--constant reminders of the old seemingly intruding on the new. 

 

I suppose others found a sense of stability in them--steam locomotives persisted as the world around them changed, until they too succumbed to "progress".

---------------------

It's an interesting topic. Certainly emotional. I'm not sure I can pinpoint the exact cause either, but I agree with what you wrote.

 

Quentin

[ikks]

I traveled from Derby to Leeds by train for a football match in the early sixties and I recall(I think!) passing a scrapyard and seeing Southern engines in the line?? Am I dreaming or was that a possibility. I can't put a date on it but the score was Leeds 1: Derby 1, Jackie Charlton was playing for Leeds that Day and Bill Currie was his direct opponent at least that's in my memory.

This has been puzzling me for years.

 

Rgds.........Mike

[rockershovel]

Apologies if I misunderstood or miswrote--I'd just woken up and was intrigued by what you'd said. I guess I sense that the prosperity and growth of the 1950s finally laid Victorian sensibilities--well past their sell-by date--to rest. Even though many promises didn't pan out, there was some sense that relics had to be let go of "in the name of progress". It's easy see how steam locomotives could've been considered 'everyday artifacts'--constant reminders of the old seemingly intruding on the new. 

 

I suppose others found a sense of stability in them--steam locomotives persisted as the world around them changed, until they too succumbed to "progress".

---------------------

It's an interesting topic. Certainly emotional. I'm not sure I can pinpoint the exact cause either, but I agree with what you wrote.

 

Quentin

I was more taking the position that the social changes of the 1945-48 period were a conscious rejection of the "Old Order", and influences within the Labour movement acting to destroy that settlement.

 

I remember a heated debate as part of British Constitution (a now-extinct GCSE subject) in which it was proposed that the then-ascending New Left were the enemies of the democratic settlement voted for in 1945. Being a minor public school at a time when the Cambridge Five were fairly recent news, and the Trades Unions being then strongly Eurosceptic the motion was heavily defeated...

[bike2steam]

The last loco built for the S&DJR in BR service, awaits it's fate at Cashmores yard in Great Bridge. A nice balancing act on a BR relay-box beside the old SSR, to get this pic !!

Edited March 17, 2016 by bike2steam

[jonny777]

It is an emotional subject, though. Why DO people show such affection for modelling things they never saw, or only saw at their very last gasp?

 

 

For me it is a way of trying to re-create what I must have seen (as a small child) but at the time had no idea of the significance of, and now have no detailed memory of; but simply a wish that my early brain could have been more like a cine film. 

 

I find it interesting that for me distant memories can be recalled simply by a brief smell of something; and often wonder that, if all the right triggers could come together at once, whether baby memories might still be possible or are they gone forever?

[adb968008]

A photo from about Feb 1966.  4 locos, rods removed, are taken south by a Western.

 

sca021.jpg

 

Dave

 

Someone hitching a lift on the footplate of that grange !

[Phil Bullock]

Think that would be a "rider" - IIRC there was something in rules about having one on dead engines

 

Phil