Memoirs of the Queensland Museum – Culture
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VOLUME 5 PART 1 MEMOIRS OF THE QUEENSLAND MUSEUM – CULTURE © The State of Queensland (Queensland Museum), 2011 PO Box 3300, South Brisbane 4101, Qld Australia Phone 61 7 3840 7555 Fax 61 7 3846 1226 www.qm.qld.gov.au National Library of Australia card number ISSN 1440-4788 NOTE Papers published in this volume and in all previous volumes of the Memoirs of the Queensland Museum may be reproduced for scientific research, individual study or other educational purposes. Properly acknowledged quotations may be made but queries regarding the republication of any papers should be addressed to the Editor in Chief. Copies of the journal can be purchased from the Queensland Museum Shop. A Guide to Authors is displayed at the Queensland Museum web site http://www.qm.qld.gov.au/About+Us/Publications/Memoirs+of+the+Queensland+Museum A Queensland Government Project Typeset at the Queensland Museum Production at the Workshops David MEWES Mewes, D. 2011 Production at the Workshops. Memoirs of the Queensland Museum – Culture 5(1):77-106. Brisbane. ISSN 1440-4788. The Ipswich Railway Workshops have served the Queensland Railways from the very beginnings of railway construction in Queensland. The railway system in Queensland developed as isolated railways based on coastal ports at Cairns, Townsville, Bowen, Mackay, Rockhampton, Bundaberg and Maryborough. Railway workshops were established to service these isolated railways. Even after the state’s isolated railway systems were finally linked together many continued to operate servicing locomotives and rolling stock allocated to their district. Ipswich, however, remained the main railway workshops in Queensland for over 100 years. During the past 140 years, Ipswich has manufactured a huge variety of locomotives, carriages, goods wagons, rail motors, parts, and innumerable other items that would be impossible to tabulate. Canvas water bags for use by track gangs and train crews as well as tents for railway track gangs and even the military were amongst items manufactured. New boilers and many other items were manufactured at Ipswich for supply to workshops and depots across the state. Ipswich was the only Queensland Railways workshop to build new steam locomotives in addition to the usual tasks of a railway workshop – the general and partial overhaul of locomotives, rail motors and rolling stock. Railway, workshop, locomotive, rail motor, rolling stock, Ipswich. D. Mewes [email protected] Memoirs of the Queensland Museum | Culture 2011 5(1) | 77 David Mewes Queensland’s first railway workshops were items but unloading at the railway wharf in established at Ipswich in 1864 to support Ipswich would have tested the ingenuity of the construction of the first public railway. those railway pioneers. Ipswich, which had been declared a port in All of the locomotives and rolling stock 1860, was chosen as the starting point for brought out from England for the Southern the Southern & Western Railway and the & Western Railway had to be handled in this new workshops would continue to provide way, at least until the railway was opened the necessary maintenance facilities for the through to Brisbane in 1876. railway when it was built. The buildings required for the workshops were brought Once the railway line had been built from out from England and assembled on the the railway wharf to the workshops site, a northern bank of the Bremer River. The first horse team was used to move the items up consignment of railway material arrived the steep river bank to the workshops until from England on 15 August 1864. Once the a locomotive was assembled and became workshops were established, one of the first available for this task. tasks required was the assembly of the four The Queensland Government appointed locomotives and necessary rolling stock that had been imported from England. Almost Charles Fox and Sons, London as their everything had to be imported from England. engineering consultants and agents in There were no local engineering works England. This firm acted on the government’s or foundries for the fledgling Southern & behalf calling tenders, letting contracts, Western Railway to call on for the fabrication purchasing equipment and undertaking the of parts or the numerous other supplies necessary inspections before despatch to necessary for the construction of a railway Queensland. The company even arranged for (Queensland Railways, 1914: 20-21). the employment and passage to Queensland for the necessary skilled workmen. When the rolling stock had passed inspection it A WORKSHOP BEGINS was disassembled and transported out from It is hard to imagine today the difficulties England as a kit of parts. They were sent out that those early railway engineers and in small sections to enable easier handling labourers must have faced in handling the when being trans-shipped at the mouth of heavy items that were required for building the Brisbane River and transported to the the railway. The transfer of sections of heavy Ipswich site where they were assembled machinery like locomotive boilers, frames, (Queensland Railways, 1914: 20). girders, machine tools and so many other Slaughter, Gruning & Company were con- things from the ships arriving from England tracted to supply the initial order for four onto small paddle steamers would have been locomotives in 1864 (QRAR, 1866: 7). This a challenge. These paddle steamers then company was at that time undergoing a re- transported the machinery up the Brisbane organisation and name change, becoming and Bremer Rivers to the railway wharf the Avonside Engine Company (Fitzgibbon, at Ipswich. Unloading from these paddle 1866:7). steamers onto the railway wharf must have presented an even bigger problem than the The first four locomotives were classed as transfer in Brisbane. Ships from overseas the A Class (Figure 1). The first locomotive to would have at least had the rigging and be put in steam after assembly at the work- heavy tackle necessary to handle these shops was named “Faugh-a-Ballagh” which 78 | Memoirs of the Queensland Museum | Culture 5(1) 2011 Production at the Workshops FIG. 1. No.3 was one of the first four locomotives delivered from the UK. It was assembled at Ipswich in 1865. Image courtesy TWRM / QR. is Gaelic for “clear the way”. This took place wagons suitable for sheep and a further on 11 January 1865 when it spent most of six for cattle, four horse boxes and two the day hauling a goods wagon and eight- wagons suitable for carrying horse-drawn wheeled coach between the workshops, vehicles. These 38 items of rolling stock were Wide Gully and the railway wharf, giving assembled at the new workshops. free rides to local people (Queensland Rail- The workshops, using some imported parts, ways, 1914: 23). constructed 12 new goods wagons between The Ipswich Railway Workshops had August and December 1865 following the assembled and trialled the remaining official opening of the railway line from three locomotives which had been named, Ipswich to Bigge’s Camp on the 31 July 1865 “Premier”, “Lady Bowen” and “Pioneer” by (Fitzgibbon, 1866: 8). the end of February 1865. Following the opening of the railway to Ashbury Railway Carriage & Iron Co Ltd., Toowoomba on the 1 May 1867 it was found Manchester, England supplied the first that there was a significant increase in carriages and wagons for the new railway. repairs needed. Ipswich Railway Workshops One Smoking Saloon, six composite, four now had to deal with turning tyres for second class and six third class passenger locomotives and wheels for carriages and carriages along with two passenger brake wagons which had travelled less than a third vans were supplied. Goods wagons of the previous distances before such work delivered comprised twelve ballast wagons, was required. The constant sharp curves on six covered wagons, four timber trucks, six the ascent of the Main Range to Toowoomba Memoirs of the Queensland Museum | Culture 2011 5(1) | 79 David Mewes caused considerable wear on locomotives The engineering facilities that the Workshops and rolling stock. provided extended to new areas. The Workshops supplied the iron roof, water This work was an unexpected addition to pipes, hydrants and other fittings for a new their already heavy workload assembling steam locomotive shed 150 feet long for the new wagons, carriages and rolling stock Railway’s Traffic Department at Ipswich in and all the other work associated with the 1876. Points and crossings were provided establishment of a new railway system for the trackwork associated with the new (Plews, 1867: 7). station in Brisbane as well as palisading for Ten years after the opening of the first the station itself. Castings and other items railway the Ipswich Railway Workshops had were produced for external customers settled into a routine of maintenance work such as the Ipswich Waterworks and the on locomotives and rolling stock as well as Government Roads Department (QRAR, the assembly of imported locomotives and 1876: 27). rolling stock, and the manufacture of local The Commissioner for Railways, A.O. rolling stock using imported parts. By the end Herbert, pointed out in his 1875 report that of 1875, expansion of the Ipswich Railway there were concerns that work at the Ipswich Workshops site was hampered by its cramped Workshops was being hampered by the late location, as its workload increased. During arrival of imported parts and the long delays that year five new locomotives imported that occurred from the date of placement of from Kitson and Co. were assembled and an order for locomotives and their arrival entered traffic and a further 11 locomotives date. The construction of new locomotives went through the Workshops for overhaul. at the Ipswich Railway Workshops had The overhaul work included the fitting of not previously been considered to be an a new boiler barrel to A Class locomotive economically viable proposition.