The Lesdham & Hereford Railway - some freelance models

[Johnson044]

Now that Edwardian has very ably set up a dialogue on freelance railways and their locomotives and rolling stock I thought it time I posted some bits and pieces of my own. The Ledsham and Hereford Railway (it’s largely in my head at the current time) consists currently of a box of C&L track components and “half a page of scribbled lines” as the song goes. However, there’s a reasonable amount of rolling stock, and a number of locomotives.
I’m going to describe what’s been built in the chronological order of construction – and I’ll be flitting between motive power and C&W departments as appropriate. Most of the models I describe have been around for a few years – and sadly I’ve only really started taking progress photos relatively recently, so apart from the most recent models the images will be largely “as built”. 
A brief word about the railway itself -  I’ll go into more depth a bit later on and hopefully, as the year goes by, report on some actual platelaying.
Basically a minor cross-country railway to main line standard, and about the size of the Maryport and Carlisle, beset with financial troubles (although never quite as penurious as the Bishop’s Castle) and never quite reaching the intended mileage. 
From West to East, commencing in Herefordshire, the stations (with one exception, all with literary connections) include:
Ledwardine
Severnbury (Riverside)
The Worrall
Summerday Sands
Porton-Le-Grange
Linwell
St Cleve
Ledsham
But more of the railway and its history later.

[Johnson044]

So – starting at the beginning:
As you can see from my nom de plume I’ve a thing about SW Johnson’s bogie passenger tank engines. It stems from the gift of a copy of “Midland Style” when I was in my mid-teens and I realised then what devilishly attractive little hussies they are.
In a Railway Modeller of about that time was an article where someone had cunningly converted the ubiquitous Tri-ang Jinty into a GWR (ex Cambrian, or maybe Midland & South Western Junction Rly I think) 0-4-4T and I reckoned such a thing might not be beyond me. Here’s the result – I just used the chassis in the end, the rest being plastikard with (from memory) the boiler from a Ration Johnson 2-4-0 (the tender of which eventually ended up behind a Tri-ang 3F) and trundling about on a set of Romfords from Harbour Models, Folkestone. it’s a model I’d dearly love to own again, warts and all, but I don’t remember what became of it – I suspect it went the way of all flesh. I remember making a new chassis out of plastikard and then it’s a blank. A further attempt – this time a Stanier / Lemon 0-4-4 got bodged up from the late ‘70’s re-tooled Hornby Jinty. 
 

[Johnson044]

I discovered one day that if I removed every alternate spoke from a Tri-ang driving wheel then the coarse profile looked quite similar to an 0 gauge wheel and I started to make what I hoped would be a model of “Northiam” on the K&ESR, using some L1 driving wheels. I didn’t follow it through but it did setf me on the 7mm scale path, the way being illuminated by a ridiculously cheap red Lima 4F from Jezzard’s of Sandwich. I’ve never looked back.

The 4F became a 3F, and I was quite pleased with it. A further one was butchered to provide wheels and footplate for a belpaire Johnson 0-4-4 whose plastikard (it never got painted) body also seemed quite good – then I took all my 7mm stuff (which included a Highfield bogie coach with lattice gates in the centre – intended from memory to be an ex-L&Y railmotor unit or some such) a Clayton class 17 (which I think was pretty grim- a Lima diesel shunter and some hardboard featured) and some Big Big mineral wagons in a box to the Westminster Central Hall show, managed to flog the lot and came home with some of the new Slater’s driving wheels, some brass sheet and boiler mountings, buffers and not a lot else. Sadly I’ve no photos from this time.

There was another magazine articlewhich hugely inspired me – “Meet Sir Hardman Earle” by Geoffrey Pember, in “Model Railways” and I was always taken with the image of the smokebox interior, with the tube plate modelled so well. So – I started with the smokebox and, my dad having given me some basic lessons in the black art of soldering, I made this little cylindrical box with lotsof holes in one end and an opening door in the other – not a true cylinder but not bad and actually drew favourable comment when I took it to school.

The only drawing I had was a 4mm one from Model Railway News of one of the Somerset and Dorset Avonside tanks, the main bits of which which I’d re-drawn to 7mm scale. I bought an Airfix MRRC 5 pole motor from ERG Models of Dover and eventually I had a loco- a bit mis-shapen and the boiler sloped downwards a little towards the cab but it ran reasonably well and I painted the loco in the brick red fictitious “Bradfield Corporation” livery of my reservoir building line based very loosely on the Nidd Valley (but transposed to Derbyshire). I named the loco “Joan”.
After a while I became discontented with what I’d made and partially dismanled the loco, hoping to sort out the blobs and distortions. Here she is at Bradfield Town station, shortly before I sold up and obsessed myself with motorcycles and other pursuits, the loco being all that I kept. She sat on a variety of bed sit mantlepieces for about a decade, getting dustier and more battered until, having become more settled and gaining a wife, I found my interest re-kindled and took the loco further to bits, losing the splashers, bogie and anything else that seemed poor to me.
 

[Johnson044]

I spent a long time flooding joints with solder and laboriously scraping back, re-profiling the valances and making some new splashers (I was particularly pleased with the brass beading that I fretted out with a piercing saw), bogie and coupling rods. I bought some Alan Gibson wheels with telescopic axles but never managed to get it to run properly and the white metal centres quickly became loose on the axles.

This time I thought I’d paint her in an approximation of the green that she would have been supplied in when built for the Somerset & Dorset and here’s a rather blurry photo. A better model but still much room for improvement and when one of the driving wheels came loose during a trial run at a Thanet 0 gauge Group open day I decided to have another go.


 

[Johnson044]

I kept the Gibson bogie wheels but bought some modern Slater’s ones, with squared axles and madesome new steel coupling rods, and having moved and re-soldered one of the bearings fractionally in an elongated hole she now ran really smoothly (and still does, with the original Airfix motor). I bought some Avonside works plates (Peter Thatcher, I think) and, something I'll never regret, took her to Bob Fridd of Canterbury for the gorgeous paint job you see in the photos, having by this time made some decisions on livery (and, indeed, the railway upon which she’ll one day run).

I’ve taken the view that a little re-writing of history means that an ill wind blew upon the S&D or Avonside and a couple of the Avonside bogie passenger tank engines either couldn’t be afforded or were rejected due to late delivery – so the Ledsham & Hereford snapped them up.

Like most of the other Lesdham & Hereford engines, she’s named “Long Mynd” after one of the Shropshire hills that I love so much.

Bob did a truly magnificent job and I’m really pleased with her. 

More to follow, hopefully soon.
 

[Signalman Rich]

Lovely to see some of your beautiful work.  I have long admired the L & H R from your writings in the columns of the Gauge O Guild Gazette.  I look forward to seeing further descriptions of your builds.  It certainly helps to have you write about the difficulties you have overcome.  Sometimes when superb models are displayed on the web it  is almost discouraging to think " I could never do that,"  but your frankness and tenacity are an inspiration.

Best wishes

Rich 

[Johnson044]

Thanks for the very encouraging words Signalman and I'm really glad you enjoyed the articles. The joy of working with sheet metal, solder and a Minicraft drill with some cutting discs is that old mistakes such as mis-shaped footplate valances can be corrected - just like welding and angle-grinding on an old vehicle- and a decent paint job can hide a multitude of sins! I see that one common factor remains throughout Long Mynd's history - the boiler is still a bit oval and flat sided!

 

Current pick ups on the bogie made a big difference to the running.

 

More on the L&H soon.

 

Thanks again. J.

[CKPR]

This I like - 0-4-4Ts, pre-grouping , scratch-building, reference to the M&CR and the fact the L&H is probably in the vicinity of our house in Richards Castle. All of this and the trials & tribulations of teenage railway modelling in the 1970s! I think the article in RM that started you off was 'Jinty at the Junction' by Brian Huxley in 1977 or 1978 IIRC.

Edited July 1, 2022 by CKPR

[Johnson044]

Thanks CKPR - I'll see if I can get hold of the MRC article for old time's sake. Just looked up Richards Castle - I think the L&H a bit further south (but still not sure!). You've got Wooferton Junction nearby - the railway / canal interchange and, indeed, the railway to Tenbury Wells have been places I've wanted to explore for years. Have you a copy of this? It's absolutely brilliant. A really good, informative narrative and some great bits of film.

 

https://www.tennentstrains.co.uk/products/media/dvd/bygone-ways-the-land-of-lost-content-dvd?code=TTDVD002

 

[CKPR]

I have literally just come back from the old station yard at Wooferton as we use the firewood and salvage businesses based there! The signal box and (G)WR signals are still in use and the old goods shed is now a commercial property. 

[NeilHB]

I’ve followed your updates in the Guild Gazette for a while, so I’m glad to see you’re posting about them on here now as well. 
 

Long Mynd is truly delightful, and I adore the livery! 
 

Looking forward to reading more reports in due course. 

[Methuselah]

On 01/07/2022 at 12:57, Johnson044 said:

Thanks CKPR - I'll see if I can get hold of the MRC article for old time's sake. Just looked up Richards Castle - I think the L&H a bit further south (but still not sure!). You've got Wooferton Junction nearby - the railway / canal interchange and, indeed, the railway to Tenbury Wells have been places I've wanted to explore for years. Have you a copy of this? It's absolutely brilliant. A really good, informative narrative and some great bits of film.

 

https://www.tennentstrains.co.uk/products/media/dvd/bygone-ways-the-land-of-lost-content-dvd?code=TTDVD002

 

That DVD sounds interesting - just ordered a copy. Woofferton was never a  canal-rail interchange, as the canal was already moribund, and the Tenbury Railway bought the remains of the canal company to use some of the land to build the railway over. A lovely area, with some very curious railways. I'm building the old S&H Woofferton Junction in 4mm, as well as the branch as far as Tenbury - with some contraction of course.

 

[Johnson044]

On 03/07/2022 at 20:00, NeilHB said:

I’ve followed your updates in the Guild Gazette for a while, so I’m glad to see you’re posting about them on here now as well. 
 

Long Mynd is truly delightful, and I adore the livery! 
 

Looking forward to reading more reports in due course. 

Thanks for the kind and supportive words Neil.

 

Hope to bash out some more on the L&H soon now back from cycling holiday in Dorset- I spent some time at Corfe where I was reminded  of  your tramway locomotives when I saw "Secundus" in the little museum in the goods shed - I must say I've found Elsbridge hugely inspiring. 

[Johnson044]

On 04/07/2022 at 21:26, Methuselah said:

That DVD sounds interesting - just ordered a copy. Woofferton was never a  canal-rail interchange, as the canal was already moribund, and the Tenbury Railway bought the remains of the canal company to use some of the land to build the railway over. A lovely area, with some very curious railways. I'm building the old S&H Woofferton Junction in 4mm, as well as the branch as far as Tenbury - with some contraction of course.

 

Ah - interesting - I knew that the line to Tenbury Wells superseded the canal but had it in my head for some reason that the remains of the canal at Woofferton co-existed with the railway for a while.

[Johnson044]

I wanted to try for myself using Tri-ang 00 wheels on a small 0 gauge loco and bought some Lord of the Isles driving wheels and other bits and pieces from East Kent Models on a day trip to Whitstable, along with some plastikard. A new baby daughter and very limited income at the time. I’d been very lucky at the Canterbury boot fair (which used to be held on the dog racing track, long-vanished under housing) and I’d bought the contents of someone’s 0 gauge scrap box, containing mainly wagon bits and a couple of new yards of Streamline for an absolute song.

The L&H was a long way in the future and I just wanted to build something. My dad, a Kiwi, had a beautifully illustrated book called “When steam was king” with many paintings of New Zealand steam locos (I have it now) and I’d often been drawn to a painting of one of the Oreti Railway engines, a Crampton type with flangeless wheels and little guide wheels running against the timber rails. I decided to build a 2-2-0 of my own, based (very) loosely on the Oreti locos, although mine isn’t a Crampton, the driving axle being in front of the firebox, along the lines of a Bridges-Adams light locomotive.

“Witch” is the result. Entirely whimsical and mainly plastikard plus bits that I had or could scrounge and supplemented by the occasional luxury such as handrail knobs and the Shedmaster NER brake standard. The name and works plates were intended for a narrow gauge quarry Hunslet (I assume that she was sent to them for a rebuild and that her original builder’s plates disappeared at that time).

 

Basically – mainly plastikard with copper water pipe boiler, brass frames with hardwood blocks for stretchers, inner frame bearings Romford, outer bearings from bits of 3 pin plug. Front wheels Alan Gibson 10 spoke wagon wheels. Outside cranks came from the centres of some Tri-ang L1 driving wheels. Safety valve bonnet fron an LNER Spencer buffer, a small open-frame motor vertically in the firebox with some 00 gears- all else from ods & sods.

As I first finished her, Witch looked like this – the livery chosen simply because my wife requested a blue engine.
 

[Johnson044]

There are various things about her that stretch the boundaries of the “Prototype for Everything Dept”- firstly, I think standard gauge locomotives with outside or double frames and outside cylinders are very thin on the ground – certainly in the UK, although in Eastern Europe there were many 0-6-0’s of this type. Secondly, having made the cylinders I wanted some semblance of valve gear so placed the valve chests under the cylinders, with a very simple cam on the driven axle to impart an (entirely un-prototypical) mottion to the valve spindles- and the only locos I can think of with valve chests underneath are Webb compounds.

[Johnson044]

The official history is that Witch was assembled in the L&H workshops from various un-related parts supplied by Isaac Watt-Boulton and ran for several years economically and efficiently, usually attached to an inspection saloon, which I’ll describe later. Sold out of service in later years to the wealthy nephew of one of the L&H directors and kept in a purpose-built shed on his estate, intended for use on his private estate railway, the construction of which never really amounted to much (although, that said, some of the earthworks including a bridge abutment beside a minor road can still be seen- as, in the right light, can some rails below the tarmac on another lane – indeed, until it was all engulfed by a solar farm, the granite sett floor of the engine shed could still be seen until recently – with an iron farm gate resting over the nettle-filled inspection pit). In later years Witch resided in a rather Rowland Emmett-like glass enclosure at Ledsham station, very much in the manner of the Furness Railway Coppernob at Barrow. Sadly the pilot of a damaged Heinkel He 111 decided his chances would be rather improved by jettisoning his bombs, resulting in Ledsham’s only air raid and, unlike Coppernob, which escaped with some dings and scratches, Witch received a direct hit and went into the melting pot. Both of the nape plates survived, one in the hands of the estate owner and the other on the wall of the tap room in “The Surfeit of Lampreys”, recently moving to the new Lesdham Heritage Centre when the pub closed.

Witch’s paintwork had a thorough overhaul by Bob Fridd in exchange for which I carried out some general repairs to a battered Slater’s 0 gauge loco and she is vastly improved. A conversion to a 2-4-0T has often been mooted, using some more LOTI and L1 driving wheels but this will probably never happen. She might very well yet go green, however.
 

[Johnson044]

A common trait amongst my models is that they tend to be started and progress erratically in fits and starts, often over many years, and other models are usually started (and sometimes finished) in the interim. Sometimes this is because I hit a major stumbling block where I can’t decide how to overcome a particular problem or find the prospect of making a particular component too daunting – or sometimes I just lose enthusiasm, especially if I’m unhappy with workmanship. I’ve said that I’m going to try to describe the models in chronological order of building and the leap-frogging makes this slightly difficult. However, as I first fretted out the frames for the following loco in 1995 then this is the next on the list- although I finally finished Christmas 2015. It’s also probably going to become a bit of a story of introspection and, indeed, self-reflection. Maybe.

Another commonality is that the chance find of a hoard of useful bits – spare etches, wheels, castings etc, usually in a box in a model shop or on Ebay- will generate a model and this one is no exception. I picked up a box of very early Slater’s driving wheels of various sizes and some coupling rods and Highfield vacuum-formed coach sides as a job lot and looked at the books and drawings I had to see what they might fit. A possibility that really appealed was a Cowan class K 4-4-0 of the GNSR, a 4mm scale drawing (containing many inaccuracies, as I later discovered) for which I had in a book. I stuck two pieces of 1/32” brass together with HD double-sided tape and, having blown the drawing up to 7mm scale I cut out a pair of frames and a few other parts. I soldered up some underhung leaf springs from individual pieces of cat food tin. At this time I had an Alan Gibson catalogue and he offered a huge range of 4mm scale pantograph-milled frames so I contacted him and he kindly agreed to make some bespoke parts for me. I cut the pierced splashers, crankpin splashers, tender frames and tender sides and beading overlays and a few other parts out of plastikard at 3 or 4 times full size and sent them off to Alan, who sent me back some really nice parts, all from relatively hard brass…. and then the project faltered as I realised just what I’d taken on. 
 

[Johnson044]

Over the next decade very little happened on the loco. Other projects came and went and I’d get the parts out from time to time and look at them, occasionally adding parts such as the Martin Finney link motion bits and I’d sketch up ideas for making and joining components. I finally decided to make some meaningful progress and, having learned how to use Autocad at work I started to draw up many more parts, this time sending the patterns to John Taylor “Uncommon Kits” of Sowerby Bridge, who made me coupling and connecting rods, keeper plates, and other ods and sods. The precision gained from pantograph milling was really liberating and the facility of Autocad rapidly became addictive. This really left only assembly to my cack-handedness- and a mini drill and cutting disc removes a lot of excess solder.

The Neilson 4-4-0 gave me some interesting challenges. Much of the finer detail was still something of a mysterybut I did manage to get hold of some better drawings and the GNSR Society kindly sent me an abstract of the later Cowan Class C, which shared certain similarities. The bottom-hung firebox door mechanism defeats me to this day though. Getting the beast to go around a 6’ radius curve whilst still having the bogie wheel splashers and somehow separating frames, footplate and boiler for painting was also a headache – and, of course, concealing a motor.
 

[Johnson044]

I decided to have another try and quite quickly made up a rolling chassis. I tried to get around the radius issue by making the frames narrower than they should be behind the driving and coupled wheels, giving the driving wheels some sidplay and having the bogie on a pivot with no sideplay. I made the cylinders about 1.5mm too far apart, as were the bogie wheel splashers. This has worked quite well but a 6’ curve is still a bit optimistic. This has made me decide to have a ruling minimum radius of 7’ on my (one day) layout, meaning that I’ll build my own pointwork.

The cylinders were turned up by a small local light engineering firm (I had no lathe then) and I drilled the soft brass bar at the ends and soldered in sections of pin to represent the bolt heads for the covers. The driving wheelset (the coupled wheels are driven on the model) has some vertical springing and compensation with alittle lever arrangement I devised. The crossheads are Martello castings intended for a GW Castle.

I cocked up with the push-on driving wheels, not quartering them properly and they had a decided wobble when corrected, so bought some new Slater’s ones intended for an Adams Radial (which shares much with the 4-4-0, especially some of the general dimensions) and the square axle ends were an absolute boon.
 

[Johnson044]

Eventually I progressed to some of the upper works, using some Laurie Griffin castings – the firebox front and the chimney and dome (which is a bit thin) adapted from Beattie LSWR ones. The boiler is acrylic tube.

The motor was a bit of an issue. It sist almost vertically inside the firebox on a brass platform which also contains the pick up wipers – the whole thing is a “power egg” that can just be unscrewed and removed without un-soldering any wiring. The motor is a bit on the small side and the weight distribution not quite right. She runs but not as well as she should and I occasionally come up with cunning plans for addressing this – but other projects get in the way.
I’ve rather jumped ahead of myself – the trouble is that I’ve no early photos. So as by this stage I’d completed a number of other projects I’m leaving the story of little 4-4-0 un-finished for a while.
 

[NeilHB]

She’s a lovely looking loco, look forward to reading more about her construction in due course. 

[Johnson044]

So – why the Ledsham and Hereford Railway? Where on earth does that come from? Well – Ledsham is the small town in Penelope Liveley’s “The ghost of Thomas Kempe” which tells the story of the mischievous Seventeenth Century sorcerer, shut up in a bottle for his misdemeanours and accidentally released to cause mayhem in the 1970’s. A long while back, when I had no fixed geographical location in mind, I bought and made up a Parkside NBR Jubilee wagon, then later picked up a very rough pre-assembled one and repaired it. They were very obviously Scottish and I decided to Anglicise one of them by losing the end door and using the fixed end and part of the sides of the other to make a PO wagon, reasoning that Thomas Kempe’s descendants might have liked to start a bottle manufactuary, glassware being in the family history. 

 

I used the tarpaulin rail fittings from amongst the Coopercraft bits that were in the box of bits from Canterbury dog track boot fair and had a go at a colourful livery using a white gel pen and a fine black one. The spare underframe has gone beneath another wagon. The worksplates are printed card from Kirtley Models, although these are closer to gauge 1 as supplied so I reduced them on the photocopier.

[Johnson044]

Well – that’s the Ledsham bit. The L&H came with what must have been my first ever Ebay win- this rather beautifully made 3 planker, from hardwood. All of the metal parts except the wheels seem to have been made from raw materials – the W irons are cut out, the axleboxes filed from the solid and the springs built up leaf upon leaf. I replaced the missing brake lever and ratchet with Ambis ones and added some couplings. I’ve absolutely no idea of the builder, or indeed the prototype.

[Johnson044]

I suspect “L & H” refers maybe to Lambton & Hetton? However, the only Lambton & Hetton ones I’ve ever seen any photos of are lettered “L H & J C” for Lambton, Hetton & Joicey (presumably) Company. The wagoon has extra baulks of timber which look like they are intended to suit chaldron waggons so it does point to the north east. Anyone got any ideas? Whatever the prototype it’s really beautifully made.  Reduced Kirtley plates again.