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BRITAIN’S LEADING HISTORICAL RAILWAY JOURNAL Vol. 29 • No. 9 SEPTEMBER 2015 £4.40 IN THIS ISSUE SHREWSBURY IN COLOUR METROPOLITAN MEMORIES THE BRISTOL & SOUTH WALES UNION RAILWAY A STOCKTON & DARLINGTON RAILWAY JOURNAL PENDRAGON AUTOCARS AND DOODLEBUGS PUBLISHING CLASS 56s IN COLOUR RECORDING THE HISTORY OF BRITAIN’S RAILWAYS Vol 29 . No. 9 No. 293 SEPTEMBER 2015 RECORDING THE HISTORY OF BRITAIN’S RAILWAY When the railway hotel was the best you could do I dare say many of us have a list of things we’d like to do or see before so also was there to be a rebirth for the wonderful hotel building. our great celestial calendar runs out of pages – a ‘bucket list’ as it’s In 2011 it threw open its doors once more (now as the St. Pancras sometimes called. Some of these might be on a grander scale – see Renaissance) and that autumn I at last walked through them to enjoy the Niagara Falls or the Northern Lights or the Taj Mahal by moonlight, a guided tour and then a light lunch, the occasion being recorded in go on safari or take a luxury cruise, though probably not nowadays the January 2012 editorial. A complete and superb rehabilitation has wander the camel route to Iraq. Most of our aspirations, on the other been achieved, though it isn’t a place to go with a lightly fi lled wallet hand, are probably pitched more moderately and within our reaches or an overstretched credit card; but then neither is a decent pub in a of attainment. side street in that part of town. My list – other than an extravagent wish to attend an Ashes Test A year later I was able to report ticking off the Midland Hotel Match in Australia – is quite modest in scope but nonetheless bringing in Morecambe, a stylish 1930s art deco structure further enlivened its own little bursts of personal satisfaction from time to time. Not by fanciful sculptures and wall decorations by that most eccentric surprisingly there are some ‘must do’ railway items on it – taking that of designers Eric Gill. Towards the end of the last century it slid into ride on the Welsh Highland Railway, mentioned last month, was one decline and eventually closure but happily it was restored to life of them and another sub-heading is ‘Visit the top railway hotels for at in 2008. After an overnight stay I breakfasted in the dining room least tea or coff ee’. overlooking beautiful Morecambe Bay, observing the rapidity with Some time ago in this column I ventured to suggest that which the tide comes in there; it became easy to realise why its sands the notion of the ‘railway hotel’ came with undertones of rather and shores are so treacherous to the unwary. dowdy smaller town establishment with dusty rooms, favoured by The railway hotel with which I have become most familiar, at commercial travellers on budgets or those set on inexpensive trysts, least from the street, is the Midland in Manchester but not until but such places were rarely railway-owned. The ‘real’ ones, perhaps this July did I step within. During the early summer it had been the with a company name, such as ‘The North British’, or with ‘Royal’ or subject of a television ‘reality’ documentary series and I do tend to be ‘Grand’ in the title, were some of the most prestigious institutions in unconvinced about the wisdom of publicity-seeking by the opening of the towns and cities they served, while experience working in a railway the corporate soul to the remorselessly intrusive gaze of the cameras. company hotel looked particularly good on your CV if pursuing a In the unfolding of events the Midland actually came out of it quite career in what we now call the hospitality industry. Many of the hotels well, perhaps rather better than the Adelphi in Liverpool did several still are amongst the best, though new ownership has brought name years ago. changes in some cases in line with corporate branding which has little In Britain’s Historic Railway Buildings Biddle describes it as “Vast, time for historic association. And, of course, we should recognise that ostentatious and pompous in red brick with copious orange-brown the old link between railway travellers and the station hotel at their terracotta decoration...” and I’ve always admired it. I was therefore starting point or destination is now tenuous. delighted to partake of afternoon tea in its graceful surroundings, Nevertheless some of the old names remain and feature on a list though fewer mewling infants would have suited me better in that that I’ve been working my way through since taking tea and biscuits refi ned ambience. At one time, at least before the First World War, the at the Gleneagles Hotel and the Welcombe at Stratford-upon-Avon Midland used to do afternoon tea, accompanied by a small orchestra, during organised visits with the LMS Society. Of course they are more on the roof around and amidst the chimney pots – summer weather accurately defi ned as ‘former’ railway hotels now since the ‘sell-off permitting, of course! Perhaps the current owners might like to think everything’ era in the 1980s but it’s their heritage which counts in this about reviving that idea, considering the cleaner air of present-day quest even if some of them, such as the Midland in Derby or the Crewe post-industrial Manchester! Arms, struck me as nothing to write home about. However, two on my With this, my railway hotel odyssey is almost complete. The list took a long time to underline in my notebook due to their having Queen’s in Leeds, the LMSR’s 1930s substantial Portland stone-fronted undergone periods of closure. edifi ce next to the City station, is perhaps the last of the big names – First up was the Midland Grand Hotel at St. Pancras station which and, like its Manchester cousin, one I’ve often walked past but never had in fact been closed since 1935 and its subsequent use as railway visited. I’ll let you know! offi ces precluded general admission to the public. 1985 saw it largely abandoned to emptiness but cometh a new era for the great station, Focus on Shrewsbury ................................................... 544 Contents Class 56 Freight ............................................................. 548 West Riding .....................................................................516 The Bristol & South Wales Union Railway Autocars and Doodlebugs – Some Edwardian and the New Passage Ferry 1857-1868 ................. 550 Transfers of Technology ............................................. 519 The Club Train 1889-1893 – Part Two .................... 557 The Case of the Brightlingsea Branch Closure.... 526 Things you don’t see now .......................................... 564 GWR ‘Castle’ 4-6-0 No.5015 In Lincolnshire ............................................................... 533 Metropolitan Memories ............................................. 566 Kingswear Castle and ‘45XX’ By Train to Somerset in the 1960s .......................... 536 2-6-2T No.5555 (one for the Readers’ Forum ............................................................. 573 magic number collectors!) ready A Catalogue of Errors – The Stockton & Darlington for duty at Shrewsbury shed in Railway Journal of George Graham ........................ 539 Book Reviews ................................................................. 574 1961. (Colour-Rail.com BRW2261) Publisher and Editor MICHAEL BLAKEMORE • E-Mail [email protected] • Tel 01347 824397 All Subscription Enquiries 01778 392024 (see inside back cover for details) • Trade Account Manager Ann Williams Design + Repro Barnabus Design in Print • Typesetting Ian D. Luckett Typesetting • IT Consultant Derek Gillibrand Printed by Amadeus Press, Ezra House, West 26 Business Park, Cleckheaton, West Yorkshire BD19 4TQ Newstrade Distribution Warners Group Publications Plc • Tel. 01778 391135 Contributions of material both photographic and written, for publication in BACKTRACK are welcome but are sent on the understanding that, although every care is taken, neither the editor or publisher can accept responsibility for any loss or damage, however or whichever caused, to such material. ● Opinions expressed in this journal are those of individual contributors and should not be taken as reflecting editorial policy. All contents of this PENDRAGON publication are protected by copyright and may not be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publishers ● Copies of photographs appearing in BACKTRACK are not available to readers. PUBLISHING All editorial correspondence to: PENDRAGON PUBLISHING • PO BOX No.3 • EASINGWOLD • YORK YO61 3YS • www.pendragonpublishing.co.uk © PENDRAGON PUBLISHING 2015 SEPTEMBER 2015 515 ABOVE: Huddersfield on 10th June 1967 and a well-cleaned LMS Class 5 4-6-0 No.45428 runs WEST RIDING through the station on its way to take over a railtour which it would haul to York, passing in front of the five-storey goods warehouse which still stands as a Grade 2 listed building. (David Idle) Some scenes in the traditional West Riding BELOW: Freight workhorse typical of the West Riding post-war – an ex-War Department ‘Austerity’ of Yorkshire – as it was 2-8-0 No.90631 (with another behind it) smoulders at Wakefield shed on 8th July 1964. It spent all before the administrative its British Railways career there from 1949 until withdrawal in January 1967. Note the overturned county changes of 1974! brazier of the sort used for keeping water columns from freezing in winter. (Bob Essery) LMS 8F 2‑8‑0 No.48542 rattles downhill through the closed Calverley & Rodley station with a southbound train of mineral empties on 30th October 1965. Note the 201 milepost on the platform, the distance from St. Pancras. The station and its area were the subject of an article in this January’s issue. (David Idle) The last few LMS ‘Jubilee’ 4‑6‑0s were to be found at Leeds Holbeck depot and enjoyed an ‘Indian summer’ on Saturday extras over the Settle–Carlisle route. No.45562 Alberta starts away from Skipton with the 06.40 Birmingham–Glasgow on 12th August 1967.