Castle Aching

[RedGemAlchemist]

Beautiful! The purchase of something this nice cannot possibly be a sin!

[Andy Kirkham]

Here’s an old map of the pre 1918 Austro Hungarian Empire. Sorry it’s in German, but you’ll see the modern countries superimposed, except that Czechoslovakia is now in two bits. The darker shading is Austria, the lighter shading Hungary, with a few subservient kingdoms thrown in. You’ll see that a good bit of the Adriatic Coast south from Trieste was Austrian territory.

I’m sure you’re a keen fan of the “Sound of Music” film, remember the head of the family in that was a guy called Von Trapp. He did exist in real life, having a distinguished career in the Austrian Navy, being an Austrian Uboat captain in the Adriatic, generally sinking Italian shipping. WW2 the Germans wanted him to pick up where he left off.

DC4E5178-636C-405A-88D5-CA804EC175F9.jpeg[attachment]

 

This https://www.amazon.co.uk/Narrow-Gauge-Railways-Bosnia-Hercegovina/dp/9172661704 is one of my absolute favourite railway books. The story of the development of railways in Bosnia is deeply political and this aspect gets very thorough coverage in the book. What was an eye-opener to me was extent of the rivalry and ill-feeling within the empire between Hungary and Austria. The acquisition of Bosnia-Herzegovina (which was under Austrian rule) gave Vienna the opportunity of a route to the sea that did not have to pass through the Hungarian territory of Croatia - an ambition that Budapest did everything it could to thwart.

 

According to this https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/2005/winter/von-trapps.html Captain Von Trapp, was actually an Italian citizen so the Nazis would have had no hold over him. I'm sure I read somewhere that in the year after their "flight" to America they returned to Germany for a concert tour.

Edited January 16, 2019 by Andy Kirkham

[Northroader]

And a “Ave Saint Jenny”, it’s a nice little loco..

[Annie]

And a “Ave Saint Jenny”, it’s a nice little loco..

I'm much too tired and sleepy this morning to attempt to write such a prayer out in Latin.

[Londontram]

That is one very pretty little loco well done for spotting it, well worth every penny I would say.

[Caley Jim]

As a 20th century Grammar school boy post WW2 , I found the need to remember dates caused a total mental block in History lessons. 

I suffered from the same affliction, which is why I dropped history in 3rd year and took geography.  As a result my knowledge of late 19th/early 20th century political machinations is sadly lacking.  My thanks to those of you who have expanded my knowledge on the subject.  Having said that, i'm not sure I understand 21st century political machinations, but I'm content to leave that as a gap in my knowledge, so no more politics please!

 

Jim

[St Enodoc]

You can even travel the area by new electric train, alighting at a station that was the biggest rip-off of LT architecture ever.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

[tebee]

Johnny-######-lately as ever (several pages back):

1

As regards railways bashing through abbeys, castles, city walls etc. - for my money Berlin takes the Biscuit.

Over the New Year I was astonished at the glee with which the post 1871 Prussian Empire embraced railways as an important visual element in making Berlin a technological Imperial Capital. 

The S-Bahn threads right across Museum Island (the equivalent of the Isle de France and Notre Dame in the Seine) and the magnificence of the old Bahnhofs such as Friedrichstrasse compared to how we were so reluctant about railway penetration into the core districts of London/Westminster south of the Euston Road.

I suppose Cannon Street with its twin towers and high arched roof and the railway bridge across Ludgate Hill were the most significant intrusions. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.karlsruhe.de/b1/stadtgeschichte/kulturdenkmale/denkmaltag_archiv/2010/fahrradtruemmer_innenstadt.de

[Nearholmer]

Is it similar to a NER 398?

 

More to the point, based on my one experience, I rate RoS highly for 'playing a straight bat'.

 

I made a similarly impulsive purchase of a 1950s Bassett-Lowke 0-6-0 goods engine that I had been on the lookout for for ages, in good cosmetic and running condition, and collected it in person as a side trip from business not too far away. We bench-tested it in the shop, but they had no coarse 0 track on which we could run it.

 

What neither RoS, nor I in my excitement, spotted was that it had the wrong chassis, from another loco, with wheels ever-so-slightly too big, and that the body had been cunningly 'jacked-up', to avoid the wheels fouling the splashers. When I got it home, I twigged this very quickly, and phoned RoS. Without a moments hesitation, and entirely taking my word for it, they apologised, arranged a courier to collect it at their cost, and squirted the purchase price back into my bank account. They subsequently pursued the chap that they'd bought it from!

 

So, I still don't have such a loco, but I do respect RoS.

[Edwardian]

Is it similar to a NER 398?

 

 

 

I would not have said so.

 

The Fletcher-era boilers did have domes with Salter valves, and there were splasher cut-outs and stove-pipe chimneys, and typically they feature prominent square sand boxes on the front frames. 

 

But, no, not really much like, and the Worsdell reboilerings took the looks even further away. 

 

What is remarkable about the Ilfracombe Goods on the Barnstaple branch is that the last survivor remained in substantially unrebuilt form until withdrawal, in 1914 IIRC, though I do not think she left Barnstaple shed very often in later years.  It does mean that she overlaps (just) with the c.1913 condition Heljan L&B Manning Wardles. A couple of T1s, a Jubilee, a Steamroller and, maybe, an O2 and I'm away! IIRC, the picture I posted earlier is said to date from 1907. 

 

 

More to the point, based on my one experience, I rate RoS highly for 'playing a straight bat'.

 

I made a similarly impulsive purchase of a 1950s Bassett-Lowke 0-6-0 goods engine that I had been on the lookout for for ages, in good cosmetic and running condition, and collected it in person as a side trip from business not too far away. We bench-tested it in the shop, but they had no coarse 0 track on which we could run it.

 

What neither RoS, nor I in my excitement, spotted was that it had the wrong chassis, from another loco, with wheels ever-so-slightly too big, and that the body had been cunningly 'jacked-up', to avoid the wheels fouling the splashers. When I got it home, I twigged this very quickly, and phoned RoS. Without a moments hesitation, and entirely taking my word for it, they apologised, arranged a courier to collect it at their cost, and squirted the purchase price back into my bank account. They subsequently pursued the chap that they'd bought it from!

 

So, I still don't have such a loco, but I do respect RoS.

 

A great story, though I'm sorry you've yet to find a pukka example.

[Compound2632]

As Tolkien said when challenged on similarities of The Lord of the Rings to The Ring of the Nibelung, "both rings were round".

[Donw]

I can well imagine a heady sense of intoxication buying it after having been in a financial straight jacket for years. It looks a delight. 

 

Don

[Edwardian]

I can well imagine a heady sense of intoxication buying it after having been in a financial straight jacket for years. It looks a delight. 

 

Don

 

Indeed.  It still feels an odd thing to have done! But I am pleased.

 

Funny that it came up now; we had recently discussed the OO Works Beyer-derived McDonnell Class 101/J15, which prompted me to consider some early Beyer 0-6-0s on the GW and finally mention the Ilfracombe Goods.

 

It would be interesting to place the new Ilfracombe Goods model next to the OO Works J15; Big Beyer and Little Beyer.

 

Now a further confession.  Some years ago, before the money finally ran out, I saw an unidentified working chassis for sale on the Bay of Fleas. 

 

It could only be one thing, in my view and, indeed, on arrival, the dimensions checked out.

 

This was a key moment in a long-term plan to attempt the L&B-LSWR interchange at Barnstaple Town.

 

The idea has been to scratch-build a plasticard body on the chassis. No rush, however, while CA is substantially incomplete. 

 

The locomotive I would have chosen to depict was 0394 in the condition represented by the model I have just purchased!

 

This leaves me two options:

 

(1) Use the chassis for one of the first 6 IGs, as re-built by the SW; or,

 

(2) Use the chassis for an even more 'as-built' IG, including original 4-wheel tender, to represent the standard Beyer product as sold to the WNR!

 

As my future representation of the Ilfracombe branch is likely to centre on the period 1907-1914, after T1s had largely supplanted the IGs, I am tending towards option 2!

 

That is for the future, however. Unless and until I have a model of Barnstaple Town to claim her, the new little IG should be perfectly at home on CA. 

[Hroth]

The passenger service from Chester to Manchester is interesting - it's listed in the GW timetable, eg pp244/245 of the summer 1936 TT, & there's no indication that it was a LMSR service. However there's plenty of evidence that the use of GW loomotives on these trains was commonplace. Although V Webster, making his first trip to Manchester in 1927 (see his Diaries reproduced in BRJ from issue 45 onwards), was surprised to find a Bulldog at Exchange I don't think it was an unusual event, in fact up until 1939 at least I think GW locos reached Manchester daily.

 

The last couple of pages of K Beck's 'The GW North of Wolverhampton' describe the services between Chester & Manchester. The book includes

photos of brand-new Earl 3212 (still named E of Eldon) & Mogul 6332 at Exchange on Chester-bound trains - both taken in May 1937. The book

also has photos of Saint 2943 (Hampton Court) & Aberdare 2662 passing Frodsham (south of Warrington) on Chester-bound passenger & goods

trains in July 1939. (Both these photos have been reproduced elsewhere  - GW Album(2) I think). There is also a pre-WW1 photo (from Lens of

Sutton) of Stella 2-4-0 3204 outside Exchange station with, slightly oddly, a smartly-dressed woman & 3 children posed in front of it

standing in the 6ft! This appears in 'The GW at its Zenith' & 'Locomotives Illustrated 92' & possibly elsewhere.

 

In his article 'A Northern Observer pt2' (GWRJ 23) Mr Shuttleworth recounts the story of the driver of Bulldog 3442 (Bullfinch) refusing assistance (from the LMSR of course) when taking a Holyhead train of 10 bogies out of Manchester!

 

Between them Beck & Shuttleworth report that 2-4-0s (various classes), Bulldogs, Cities, Flowers, Earls, Moguls, Aberdares, Saints, & Halls would have worked these trains over the years.

 

These are a couple of interesting points from these photos. The 3 taken at Exchange shew the locos with full tenders which suggest that

they were coaled at Patricroft (?) when being turned. This seems surprising - I would have thought that the 3500gall tenders of 3212 &

6332 would have held enough for the round trip from Chester, although it might have different for the Stella's driver with a 2000gall

tender. The other point is that in all cases the passenger stock is LMSR - there's no sign of chocolate & cream relieving the drabness of

Manchester Exchange. This makes the use of GW locos difficult to explain but I think it was a feature of the manner in which the

services over the joint lines were organised. Many years ago I attended a talk about these services given at the NW Group of the

GWSoc - the recollection is a bit hazy because it was circa 1980 but I seem to remember that the use of GW locos to Manchester was primarily a means of balancing the GW/LMS engine mileage over the Birkenhead Joint Lines - so perhaps we have accountants to thank!

 

I'm sorry to have rambled on but as I lived in Cheshire for 15 years until 1984 I have an interest in this overlooked corner of the GW empire. Beck ends his book by pointing out that it was Warrington - not Birkenhead - that was the furthest point on the GWR 'North of Wolverhampton'!

 

Martin

 

"Rambling on" is par for the course in these parts, and when its as informative as your discourse then its a welcome ramble into overlooked territory.  I was aware that the GWR and the LNWR/LMS shared out duties on the "Joint" but I didn't realise that it included the penetration of GWR timetabled services into Manchester on a regular basis!  I do like the anecdote of a GWR driver turning down the suggestion that his Bulldog wouldn't be able to cope with 10 coaches too!

 

I'm still not sure that Warrington was the furthest GWR point "north of Wolverhampton".  Having dug out an old OS 1" sheet 100, I see that West Kirby Joint lies at 213870 and Birkenhead Woodside at 329891.  As Warrington is split between the extreme edges of sheets 100 and 101 its a bit difficult to determine where the "official" point might be, but I can't make out anything that is logically above 600890!

 

 

Sheet 100 https://maps.nls.uk/view/91576426

Sheet 101 https://maps.nls.uk/view/91576429

 

(Source: National Library of ScotlanD)

[Nick Holliday]

Indeed.  It still feels an odd thing to have done! But I am pleased.

 

Funny that it came up now; we had recently discussed the OO Works Beyer-derived McDonnell Class 101/J15, which prompted me to consider some early Beyer 0-6-0s on the GW and finally mention the Ilfracombe Goods.

 

It would be interesting to place the new Ilfracombe Goods model next to the OO Works J15; Big Beyer and Little Beyer.

 

Now a further confession.  Some years ago, before the money finally ran out, I saw an unidentified working chassis for sale on the Bay of Fleas. 

 

It could only be one thing, in my view and, indeed, on arrival, the dimensions checked out.

 

This was a key moment in a long-term plan to attempt the L&B-LSWR interchange at Barnstaple Town.

 

The idea has been to scratch-build a plasticard body on the chassis. No rush, however, while CA is substantially incomplete. 

 

The locomotive I would have chosen to depict was 0394 in the condition represented by the model I have just purchased!

 

This leaves me two options:

 

(1) Use the chassis for one of the first 6 IGs, as re-built by the SW; or,

 

(2) Use the chassis for an even more 'as-built' IG, including original 4-wheel tender, to represent the standard Beyer product as sold to the WNR!

 

As my future representation of the Ilfracombe branch is likely to centre on the period 1907-1914, after T1s had largely supplanted the IGs, I am tending towards option 2!

 

That is for the future, however. Unless and until I have a model of Barnstaple Town to claim her, the new little IG should be perfectly at home on CA.

 

Comparing the old chassis with that on your new acquisition, it looks to me as if the new one has been fitted with a proprietary chassis, which seems to fit the wheelbase well, but looks as if it has slightly smaller wheels and heavy balance weights. If the old one fits the body, I'd be inclined to swap the chassis, and use the "new" one for a slightly freelance WNR Beyer, for the future. Whatever, both appear to be excellent buys.

[Edwardian]

Comparing the old chassis with that on your new acquisition, it looks to me as if the new one has been fitted with a proprietary chassis, which seems to fit the wheelbase well, but looks as if it has slightly smaller wheels and heavy balance weights. If the old one fits the body, I'd be inclined to swap the chassis, and use the "new" one for a slightly freelance WNR Beyer, for the future. Whatever, both appear to be excellent buys.

 

A good point, indeed, the thought had crossed my mind.

 

The separate chassis looks to be finer work, for instance, look at the rods.

 

Matters for assessment when the loco arrives.

[Talltim]

As a 20th century Grammar school boy post WW2 , I found the need to remember dates caused a total mental block in History lessons.

In my view it’s better to remember the facts. The dates can be looked up if needed.

[Caley Jim]

In my view it’s better to remember the facts. The dates can be looked up if needed.

Not in the middle of an exam, they can't!

 

Jim

[Guy Rixon]

Were Dreadnoughts actually any good as war-fighting weapons, as opposed to things to be flaunted in an attempt to intimidate?

 

Yes, in a strategic sense, for wars around the coast of Europe. A power with battlefleet superiority could impose distant blockade on it enemy and that enemy could do nothing about it. The RN blockaded Germany with a double-handful of small ships (IIRC 7 obsolete, light cruisers and 3 borrowed liners) because the German High Seas fleet was not quite large enough to engage the RN's Grand Fleet.

 

The entire course of the naval war in the North Sea was the Kreigsmarine trying to chip away enough RN dreadnoughts to win a battlefleet engagement, get dreadnought superiority and then lift (or reverse) the blockade. Jutland was exactly that and was actually a British victory because the Grand Fleet remained intact and the Germans remained blockaded. Jellicoe was the one British commander who could have lost the war in one action; but he did everything right, maintained his fleet and the power to blockade, and allowed us an eventual victory. Later, they sacked him for it, but that's just the usual faeco-plenarity of politicians.

 

There was also the case where two RN dreadnoughts (battlecruisers; Craddock's command) sailed to the south Atlantic and ended the entire German far-east fleet in the battle of the Falklands. The presence of dreadnought battlecruisers made traditional armoured cruisers useless.

[wagonman]

Is it similar to a NER 398?

 

 

 

 

 

Other than both having six wheels, no. The Ilfracombe Goods is much smaller for a start and is a classic Beyer design of the period with a few Beattie peculiarities bolted on for good measure. I'm sure there were many other differences hidden under the bonnet.

[Northroader]

I don’t think the NER class 398 is a very valid comparison with the LSWR ilfracombe goods. Without going into dimensions, a 398 loco only in working order weighed 37t 6c, an IG was 23t 16c, so the NER engine had much more meat on it. They did the best of the goods train work on the ECML. Getting up to Morthoe is a struggle for any loco, and the track as laid was restrictive for heavier engines.This is why the Ilfracombe Goods became sought after on the Colonel Stephens lines when the LSWR retired them.

Here’s a useful link:https://colonelstephenssociety.co.uk/light%20railway%20modelling/light%20railway%20modelling%20-%20ilfracombe%20goods.html

Edited January 17, 2019 by Northroader

[Martin S-C]

Yes, in a strategic sense, for wars around the coast of Europe. A power with battlefleet superiority could impose distant blockade on it enemy and that enemy could do nothing about it. The RN blockaded Germany with a double-handful of small ships (IIRC 7 obsolete, light cruisers and 3 borrowed liners) because the German High Seas fleet was not quite large enough to engage the RN's Grand Fleet.

 

The entire course of the naval war in the North Sea was the Kreigsmarine trying to chip away enough RN dreadnoughts to win a battlefleet engagement, get dreadnought superiority and then lift (or reverse) the blockade. Jutland was exactly that and was actually a British victory because the Grand Fleet remained intact and the Germans remained blockaded. Jellicoe was the one British commander who could have lost the war in one action; but he did everything right, maintained his fleet and the power to blockade, and allowed us an eventual victory. Later, they sacked him for it, but that's just the usual faeco-plenarity of politicians.

 

There was also the case where two RN dreadnoughts (battlecruisers; Craddock's command) sailed to the south Atlantic and ended the entire German far-east fleet in the battle of the Falklands. The presence of dreadnought battlecruisers made traditional armoured cruisers useless.

Good points. I had completely forgotten the Falklands action. I feel that Graf Spee had become fatalistic by then, however. He possibly could have continued his raiding campaign into the South Atlantic but probably knew that soon the RN would respond with force after Coronel. Churchill was however very wary about sending Sturdee to the S Atlantic with two I class battlecruisers because it left the Grand Fleet with almost no excess of dreadnought numbers over the High Seas Fleet. The German high command was not to know it but after Audacious sank and while Invincible and Inflexible were away at the Falklands the schedule of refits of RN capital ships meant that for a few critical weeks the Germans actually had exact parity of numbers with the Grand Fleet. After the start of 1915 when more RN dreadnoughts joined Jellicoe's fleet however, the Germans lost the race and never again had such a good opportunity to face the RN in a set piece battle.

 

Discussion about the North Sea Barrage is interesting but if we head off into hypothetics, the dreadought type was just a logical extension of all the incremental design advances of the last several decades, so without dreadnoughts WWI in the N Sea would have seen two pre-dreadnought fleets standing off, so the advent of big gun vessels on both sides wasn't actually a necessary or even useful thing, it was just the arms race doing what arms races do, pushing ever onwards, almost blindly, to try to always be stronger than your predicted enemy.

 

Whatever force the RN had at its disposal to support the blockade between the Shetlands and Norway, the German High Seas Fleet would have faced the same problem. The RN in the first two decades of the 20th century was always going to outbuild the Kriegsmarine due to the imbalance of industrial output and technical knowledge and experience of ship building. That was really part of my argument about the (lack of) usefulness of the all big gun battleship.

 

It took another war and a mass U-Boat production schedule to really threaten Britain and strain the RN to the limit. Even then we didn't quite break - very nearly but not quite.

[Nearholmer]

I think I'd better buy/borrow/steal a book about Dreadnoughts.

 

Can anyone recommend a current one that goes into the strategic and 'arms race' aspects, rather than being the written equivalent of an eagle cutaway diagram.

 

(Which, very OT, reminds my when the shades fell from my eyes about the Daily Mail. I used to buy it some days, partly because it was a usable size for reading on the crowded train to work. Then the Falklands War came along - the recent one with Argentina, not the one with Dreadnoughts - and the DM 'analysis' consisted of loads of jingoistic verbiage, maps with arrows, as per the opening of Dad's Army, and pictures of planes/ship pointing out their armaments. It struck me that this wasn't really helping me to understand the 'whys and wherefores', which I guessed might be subtle, and I then looked at the rest of the paper more thoughtfully, and never bought it again.)

[Hroth]

I've a book about the politics behind the development of the Dreadnoughts, but I can't recall its name, author or know where it is in my bookstacks!  However, its a thick brick of a book, so there must be something interesting in it....

 

As for newspapers in general, once you realise they have some political axe to grind (subtle or not), then you tend to lose faith in the whole tribe.  Of course, the ones that are low-grade gossip rags can be disregarded at face value!

 

Ok.  A bit of simple googling after I wrote the above produced the info that the book is "Dreadnought" by Robert K Massie.  As I thought, the development of the super-battleship is set in the context of European political developments from late Victorian times to the eve of WW1. Its a fairly old book (1991) so there may be more modern views to be had.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreadnought_(book)

Edited January 17, 2019 by Hroth

[Martin S-C]

I think I'd better buy/borrow/steal a book about Dreadnoughts.

 

Can anyone recommend a current one that goes into the strategic and 'arms race' aspects, rather than being the written equivalent of an eagle cutaway diagram.

 

I can recommend all three of these. "Jutland - An Analysis of the Fighting" is just about Jutland and deals with the combat in intense detail. It actually analyses the impact and result of every single large calibre shell hit on both sides in the battle. Its nonetheless a fascinating read and draws what are now thought to be the correct conclusions as to why four British capital ships exploded at the battle. It also demonstrates conclusively that heavy calibre shell hits can cause severe damage even if a ships armour belt keeps the main burst of the explosion out which is something the "rivet counters" in the wargaming community often fail to appreciate - both in naval big gun combat and in armoured warfare on land.

 

The other two are more general histories of the arms race, the whys and wherefores of the British-German naval war and are comparable. Both are excellent. All three books are oldish now though with "Rules of the Game" being the most recent at 2006. I haven't read any more recent accounts but there may be some newer revisionist stuff worth reading.

 

I can't find my copy of "The Great Gunnery Scandal" and that is a good read too and discusses the politics and in-fighting of vested interests in the RN in the build-up to war over rangefinding and fire control computers with an allegedly much better design offered to the navy by an "outsider" being dismissed in favour of a cruder less effective FCC system developed in-house. The conclusion being that Jutland may have had a very different tactical result if the RN had been equpped with different fire control computers.