^{North British Railway Study Group Journal Number 140-159}
Key to all Issue Numbers

NBR No. 1, an 0-6-0 originally built in 1870, at Scotland Street. See Euan Cameron’s article starting on page 4 for more information.

No. 140 (August 2020)

Obituary Alasdair Alexander (Sandy) Maclean. 3
Born in Edinburgh, Sandy lived in Morningside Road in a flat overlooking the Edinburgh Suburban line. After an education at George Heriot’s School he joined the railway as a Junior Clerk at Newington. He served his two years National Service in the RAF before returning to Morningside Road as a booking clerk. He was successful in being selected for Management Training and one notable job was head of the Coaching Plant section in the Operations department of ScotRail HQ in Glasgow where he made a particular impact on revolutionising carriage cleaning with the introduction of more scientific methods. Living in Greenock, Sandy seldom strayed from his home in his latter years. "Sandy was, in railway terms, without a doubt in my mind one of the most informative and intelligent people I have ever met. Always ready to help he was a true gentleman". Includes a portrtait.

Euan Cameron. Thomas Wheatley’s ‘untypical’ freight 0-6-0s. 4-16
First batches built in 1870-1, before a larger,more homogeneous series appeared in 1873 [already discussed and illustrated in Journal issue No. 138, pp. 9-13]. These "very plain little engines shared the characteristic robustness and solidity of all Wheatley’s locomotive chassis, and after rebuilding most ran until the First World War. A few survived beyond the end of hostilities."
Wheatley rebuilds of R. & W. Hawthorn 0-6-0s of the 64 series, J110 in the Group List, 1921 diagram book 70
When Wheatley succeeded the disgraced William Hurst as Locomotive Superintendent of the NBR in 1867 he faced an urgent need to improve or replace, that part of the surviving stock of locomotives which had been built before the middle 1850s, derived both from the N.B. itself and from absorbed constituent companies. In the case of the North British itself, 70 of the first 71 locomotives had been built by R. & W. Hawthorn of Newcastle upon Tyne. The Hawthorns had a fatal design flaw which went back to their origins in the Stephenson ‘Patentee’ design, the consequences of which became worse as the engines grew larger [see Journal No. 128, pp. 3-4 for a fuller discussion, also D.K. Clark’s Railway Machinery, vol 1 p. 233]. The key document prepared at Cowlairs from 1867 onwards, known to devotees as the ‘Cowlairs 1867 List’ was essentially a record of the necessary replacement, one for one, of the vast majority of this early stock.
Some of the very last NBR Hawthorn 0-6-0s were reconstructed in such a way that their successors counted as rebuilds rather than replacements. They are described here as fully as possible, and it is up to the reader to decide whether ‘rebuilding’ is an apt description or not. The general arrangement of the original Hawthorn 0-6-0s Nos. 64-71 of 1850-1 has not survived, but it is believed that photograph of Edinburgh Waverley East End by the early photographer Thomas Begbie shows one taking water. The engine has heavy outside sandwich frames and – judging by the presence of angled supports from the outside frame to the boiler – appears to have had the slender and ineffective inner framing which stretched from the cylinder block back to the firebox. The firebox was larger in diameter than the boiler barrel, which was domeless. According to the description in the Cowlairs list, these original engines had 17-ft by 24-in cylinders, lined up to 16-in diameter in some cases, and 4-ft 9-in diameter wheels spaced 7-ft 4-in + 6-ft 8-in apart. Some accounts claim that the engines began their existence with 18-in bore cylinders but had to be reduced almost immediately. Sandwich-framed six-wheel tenders were supplied. The ‘rebuilding’ of these locomotives occurred between 1868 and 1872. In association with their rebuilding – but slightly after – a most peculiar renumbering took place, by which (apparently) 64/5/6 were renumbered 9-11, and 70 was renumbered 14. Surely Nos. 67-8 should have become 12 and 13, but that change never happened. No. 67 was rebuilt at St Margaret’s in 1868 with similar wheels and cylinders to the original, with the coupled wheelbase adjusted to 7-ft 4-in+ 7-ft 6-in. A domeless boiler was fitted, similar to the original but with a flush rather than raised firebox. The remainder, 64/9, 65/10, 66/11, 68 and 70/14 were all rebuilt at Cowlairs. The rebuilding list gives them 4-ft 6-in wheels, except that 14 received 5-ft 0-in wheels (an anomaly confirmed by photographs). In all cases the Cowlairs rebuilds had their axles spaced 7-ft 3-in + 7-ft 9-in The outside frames were dismantled and rebuilt with the large plates carrying the axlebox horns reassembled on to a new longitudinal frame.  But with No. 14 it is likely that the hornplates were completely new, as those on the rebuilt engine were trapezoidal shaped with straight sides, rather than the concave curves seen on the others.
All these rebuilds received new inside mainframes, running the length of the engine from buffer- to drag-beam, with additional bearings for the driving axle. The massive structure created by the four full-length frames secured back and front will have done a much better job of keeping the cylinders and axleboxes in correct alignment. The cylinders of all except No. 67 were 16-in bore x 24-in stroke, a standard size for Wheatley goods locomotives and used on nearly all the engines discussed in this article.
The boilers of the rebuilds were quite different from the originals, as the latter will have had a firebox too wide to fit between the inside frames. It is likely that the Hawthorn ‘rebuilds’ received something like a Cowlairs standard boiler of the 1865-1870 period, with an approximately 4-ft 0-in diameter barrel 10-ft 2-in long and a flush round-topped firebox 5' 0" long. A large proportion of Wheatley’s engines received a version of this boiler. In the pre-1871 period such boilers were typically domeless with a safety-valve trumpet over the centre of the firebox crown, with the ‘trumpet’ part located on a square base with a flat top. As first built, they possibly had Salter safety valves, but Wheatley replaced these in the early 1870s with direct-loaded sprung valves entirely enclosed in the trumpet. Some engines (10 and 68 as far as we know) received open-topped dome covers over their safety valves in place of the Cowlairs trumpets, probably purloined from other engines; but these did not enclose a steam dome.
Weatherboards were fitted, sometimes with bent-over tops, and 68 was given a facsimile of an enclosed Wheatley upper section to its cab, probably in the 1880s. The 1870s recreations of the Hawthorns carried reconstructed outside frames to different dimensions from the originals, and all new wheels, inside frames, boilers, and platework. Does this count as a ‘rebuild’ or a new construction? One reason to describe them as rebuilds may have been financial: renewing an engine with the same number as a predecessor allowed the cost to be written down to repairs rather than new building.
Given the (theoretical) age and chequered history of these rebuilds, it might surprise that Matthew Holmes gave four of them a fresh lease of life by rebuilding them yet again: yet he did. The rebuilding in this case involved a reboilering, with the addition of locomotive steam brakes, updated boiler fittings, and a Holmes round cab. No. 11 was rebuilt in 1884, 10 in 1886 and 9 in 1896. 68 was rebuilt at some point around 1900, the precise date not certain. Nos. 67 and 14 were not rebuilt. The boilers were of what is presumed to have been the same size as the 1870s versions, but with all Holmes’s characteristic fittings. The barrels were 10' 2" long and the fireboxes 5' 0" long. There were 171 tubes x 1¾-in diameter, tube heating surface of 817 ft²., firebox heating surface 83.5 ft²., total 900.5 ft². Boilers with these identical dimensions were also fitted to the Longbacks and the No. 1 series 0-6-0s (as below) when rebuilt. The tenders attached to the rebuilds were generally borrowed from other 0-6-0 locomotives and varied greatly. It must be presumed that as the engines left Cowlairs they were simply allocated whatever tender happened to be available. Some of the tenders from R. & W. Hawthorn locomotives long outlived their original locomotives, coupled to other engines altogether; yet curiously very few Hawthorns actually kept their own tenders.
Wheatley No. 59 series of reconstructed 0-6-0s, sometimes known as Longbacks, J124 in the Group List, 1921 diagram book 71
Between 1868 and 1869 Wheatley also constructed eight double-framed 0-6-0s at Cowlairs, in many respects very similar to the rebuilt Hawthorns. These engines were assigned random numbers of dismantled locomotives and have therefore been regarded as replacements rather than rebuildings. The most striking difference between these engines, known unofficially as Longbacks and the rebuilt Hawthorns is that most of the engines built new (with the exception of 154/5) received substantial, deep, slotted frames of continuous metal plate outside the wheels as well as inside. The resulting mainframes will have been exceptionally robust, and the locomotives worked for many years. 154 and 155 had composite outside frames with hornplates riveted to a longitudinal iron beam, more in the manner of the Hawthorns but with a different profile to the hornplates. Photographs of 135, 154 and 155 survive in their original condition.
Miscellaneous locomotives rebuilt with double frames and outside cranks in the 1860s-1870s
Besides the more or less identifiable ‘classes’ of outside-framed 0-6-0s, there was also a handful of individual locomotives, mostly reconstructed from Hawthorn material, but associated with different original company owners and often with rather unclear histories.
No. 17
Double-framed 0-6-0 No. 17 appeared from St Margaret’s works in 1869. Theoretically it was a ‘rebuild’ of one of the original Hawthorn 0-4-2s supplied to the N.B. before it opened, but in this case little or nothing of the original engine can have been incorporated in the rebuild. No unambiguously identifiable image of the locomotive in its 1869 condition survives; but one may assume that the boiler and fittings were similar to those of No. 67. The outside frames, however, were of the same deeply slotted continuous plate as on most of the Longbacks, which were of course Cowlairs engines. 17 had 4-ft 7" wheels spaced 7-ft 6-in+ 7-ft 6-in. Holmes rebuilt 17 in either 1896 or 1898 (sources differ) and it was attached to a tender purloined from a Neilson 90 Class 2-4-0 of 1861 (all but one of which had by that time been scrapped). It was long associated with Thornton shed, where it seems to have been used on service trains.
No. 50
No. 50 was an exceptional survival from an earlier series of Hawthorn 0-6-0s, Nos. 47-54. It was comprehensively rebuilt in early 1869 in the same way as 67, retaining its distinctive curved outside frames. As rebuilt it had 4' 2" wheels with conventional spokes, spaced 7-ft 6" + 7' 6". It was rebuilt in 1882 (probably by Holmes although it retained some Drummond aspects to the boiler fittings) and lasted as No. 1030 to late 1910. It was attached to one of Wheatley’s scrap 4-wheel tenders with a chassis constructed of very thick wooden baulks at the sides and ends, to which strengthening plates were riveted. It served as the Carlisle Canal trip pilot for some time.
Two others of the same series, 47 and 52, were rebuilt at Cowlairs in 1874 and St Margaret’s in 1868 respectively. Neither received a second rebuilding and they appear to have escaped the attention of photographers. Nos. 137-9
137-9 were three 0-6-0s supplied by Hawthorns to the Edinburgh, Perth and Dundee Railway in 1851. 137 and 138 were rebuilt at Cowlairs in July and May 1868 respectively. They had 5-ft 0" wheels and typical Hawthorn outside frames, probably spaced 7-ft 2-in + 6' 6-in. Neither received a second rebuilding. 137 retained a massive six-wheeled Hawthorn tender, and was based at Dundee.
Nos. 249-50
Two Neilson 0-4-2s were supplied to the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway in 1851. According to the Cowlairs 1867 List, they were replaced by two engines of the same numbers built at Cowlairs in December and October 1867 respectively: but the list describes them as 0-4-2s with 5-ft 0-in wheels spaced 7-ft 9-in + 7-ft 1-in. 250, at least, was definitely a 0-6-0 incorporating Hawthorn material, though the reported wheelbase may well be correct. In the early 1890s it was photographed at Cowlairs with a domeless boiler with lock-up safety valves over the firebox crown, and a box lower section to the cab surmounted by a partial upper section of vaguely Drummond appearance. In 1896 it was rebuilt by Holmes with his usual fixtures and fittings.
250/873/1073 had a Stephenson 4-wheel tender before its second rebuilding and a Wheatley 6-wheel 1,800 gallon tender when photographed at Ladybank in the 1900s.
No. 280
280 was somewhat unusual although resembling those discussed above in general layout. It was reportedly built at Cowlairs in 1865 as a 0-6-0 with 4-ft 9-in wheels spaced 7-ft 7-in + 7-ft 6-in. It had the usual Cowlairs boiler of the period, but the flat weatherboard had an arched top, and bulged outwards around the spectacle plates before narrowing down to join the lower section of the cab. This style of weatherboard appears also to have been used on 2-4-0s 235/6/9 built around the same time. It received a 6-wheel tender similar to that attached to 68. 280 lasted long enough to receive its 800 series number after 1895, though it was not rebuilt by Holmes. The No. 1 and 2 series inside-framed 0-6-0s built with 4-ft 2-in wheels and 7-ft 3-in + 7-ft 9-in wheelbase, 1921 diagram book 41
The final classes to be reviewed here were two batches of goods 0-6-0s of great simplicity and solidity, built for slow mineral traffic around 1870-1871. Unfortunately some inaccurate information in print makes it at times difficult to distinguish between the two series, which differed in wheelbase from their first building onwards.
Twelve 0-6-0s were built, mostly in 1870-1, with solid slotted inside frames similar to those on 0-6-0ST No. 220 [see issue No. 138 pp. 6-7] with which they shared wheel sizes and wheelbase, 4-ft 2-in wheels spaced 7-ft 3-in + 7-ft 9-in. As one of the class was given the number 1 released by the scrapping of the original Hawthorn 0-4-2, they became known as the 1 class. The Wheatley 0-6-0 so numbered retained that distinction until it became 1150 and its capital number was taken over by a Reid 4-4-2T.
According to some records, including official ones, the first of the class, No. 251, was built as early as 1867, but its design similarity to the other engines makes this rather unlikely. The 15-ft 0-in wheelbase engines had inside frames only, no brakes on the locomotive, very simple domeless boilers with safetyvalves over the firebox crown, and simple weatherboards above the cab side-boxes. The cylinders of all these engines were 16-in x 24-in. They received Wheatley’s 1,800 gallon tenders. Matthew Holmes rebuilt all twelve locomotives between 1894 and 1900, slightly increasing the wheel diameter to 4-ft 3-in with thicker tyres and raising the running plate height accordingly. The rebuilds received the same boilers as the rebuilt Hawthorns and Longbacks, and were fitted with locomotive brakes for the first time. The tenders were not altered.
Between October and December 1871 Wheatley added 6 more locomotives but these from first construction differed from the original 12. The latter six engines (known as the ‘2’ class) had wheelbases 6-in shorter than the previous twelve, at 6-ft 9-in + 7-ft 9-in. While photographs of this class in original state are extremely rare, a picture of 223 shows it to have had a boiler with a dome on the centre of the barrel. By inference from the data from the rebuilding, it may be supposed that these boilers had a barrel 9-ft 7-in – 9-ft 10-in long and a firebox 5-ft 0-in long. The 2 class later formed the basis for the much more numerous and better recorded ‘430’ class, which they resembled in wheelbase and cylinder sizes.
Matthew Holmes rebuilt all six between 1887 and 1901. They received the shorter boilers already designed for the rebuilt Beyer, Peacock locomotives formerly of the E. & G.R., with 9-ft 7-in boiler barrels and all Holmes’s usual fittings. Most if not all of these locomotives appear to have been attached to Wheatley 1,800 gallon six-wheel tenders throughout their existence.
Most of the 1 and 2 class lasted until withdrawal between 1913 and 1915, by which point they were over 40 years old. Some lasted in traffic until 1920, and 1196 ex 252, with possibly others, survived long enough to carry its duplicate number in large control numerals on the tender. By that stage most of these early locomotives were in use as yard pilots or for very short trip workings. As an example, when No. 2 was a pilot at Portobello it was also regularly assigned to a trip goods to Dalkeith. There are oral traditions concerning the allocations of many of these locomotives, but as the traditions often contradict each other, they are omitted here as unreliable. It is remarkable that well into the 20th century North British Railway yards would have seen locomotives shunting and running short trip goods, which had their origins dating back to the 1860s or even the 1850s. The N.B. was a very cautious and parsimonious railway (by and large) and Matthew Holmes in particular seems to have been determined to make good use of any serviceable material that could be found. The only critique that one might make of keeping such venerable antiques in traffic was that when so many 1860s locomotives had to be withdrawn within a few years after 1910, the N.B. was left with a shortage of locomotives, which plagued it until after grouping even despite the proliferation of more modern engines. Meanwhile these quaint old engines kept the cadre of N.B. engine photographers well occupied

Carriages. 17

Donald Cattanach. General Pasley and the inspections of the NBR in 1846 and 1847. 18-27
Adds much to our understanding of General Pasley and the development of early railway inspections for the Board of Trade, especially under Dalhousie. It also summarises the effects of the British climate upon a "difficult" section of the East Coast Main Line which is prone to flooding and severe coastal erosion; both factors being exacerbated by Global Warming. Includes a reproduction of the letter sent by Pasley to Dalhousie on 18 May 1846 recording his (first) inspection of the line. This is also intersting in that it also records his inspection of the tubes being manufactured in Manchester for the Menai crossing. Pasley was accompanied on the inspection by Charles Jopp, Resident Engineer, and his assistant, and by James Bell, also then in the employment of the Engineer of the line, John Miller, but who would be appointed the NBR’s Resident Engineer on the opening of the line (and, later, its first Engineer-in-Chief).
Pasley's inspection took place within a day and he found some of the structures extremely sound, but others were very poor including two bridges which were required to be rebuilt. Some included rubble stone. The line was not sanctioned to be opened. Pasley returned on 17 June 1846 to inapect the formerly unsound structures and did permit the opening on 22 July. On 31 July subsidence at Markle caused the 04.30 southbound mail to derail. Both the drivver and locomotive superintendent Robert Thornton who was also on the footplate escaped with severe bruising. Thornton also drove Pasley around by locomotive. On 28 September the area experienced torrential rainfall and the line was  severed in several places, notably at the crossings of the Eye Water and the Tower Burn south of  Cockburnspath.
Includes the Penmanshiel Tunnel tragedy on Saturday 17 March 1979, when workmen lowering the base of the tunnel were entombed in a major rockfall wwhich led to the railway being diverted onto a new alignment.

* The present alignment is much closer to the cliff face, which is covered with netting to stabilise the bank. The A1 road runs at the top of the cliff. On Saturday 20 June 2020, the 1E11 from Edinburgh to St Neots is traversing the 90mph section, nearing the Scottish Border.

Alan Simpson. West Fife pits and the NBR: Part 6 – the Cowdenbeath Coal Co. era. 28-37
Area comprises parishes of Ballingry and Beath and town of Cowdenbeath and village of Lumphinnan. Kelty descibed in Journal 136 and Lochgelly in Journal 139.
Predecessors to the North British Railway: The public railway system came to the area in the late 1840s with the opening on 4 September 1848 by the Edinburgh & Northern Railway (E&NR) of the line from Thornton to Crossgates. This line, which ran to the east of the present day town of Cowdenbeath, had stations locally at Cowdenbeath and at Crossgates. The E&NR changed its name to the Edinburgh, Perth and Dundee Railway (EP&DR) from 1 August 1849. The line was later extended to Dunfermline on 13 December 1849 where it made an end-on junction at a joint station with the Stirling & Dunfermline Railway later called Dunfermline Upper station [following the closure of what was the eastern part of the Stirling and Dunfermline the local Sheriff Court and a retail park are on its site].
The next local public railway development (lying between Cowdenbeath and Lochgelly) was the opening to traffic in June 1860, of a junction, called Lumphinnans Junction, between the EP&DR and a new local railway company called the Kinross-shire Railway. This later line headed southwards from Kinross, where it had made an end-on junction (and had a joint station) with yet another local line called the Fife & Kinross Railway which The EP&DR itself in turn was vested in the NBR on 1 August 1862 and this brought the NBR to Fife. Much later, the public railway layout of the area was transformed by the building of new lines which were part of the overall Forth Bridge approach railways which opened in the early 1890s. Their construction was undertaken by the NBR as part of the creation of a continuous double-tracked trunk route from the Forth Bridge to Perth (in part by upgrading existing lines but in others by building entirely new stretches of line). In Fife and Kinross-shire these lines were:
• An entirely new line from the northern landfall of the Bridge to Inverkeithing;
• An entirely new line from Inverkeithing eastwards to Burntisland where it joined the former EP&DR;
• Upgrading to main line standard the northern section of the former Dunfermline and Queensferry Railway (from Inverkeithing to Townhill Junction on the Thornton to Dunfermline line);
• An entirely new line from Cowdenbeath Junction to Kelty;
• Upgrading to main line standard of the line from Kelty to Kinross, Milnathort and Mawcarse on the former Fife & Kinross Railway section;
• An entirely new line from Mawcarse and through Glenfarg to Bridge of Earn.
The ‘Kelty Loop’ (Cowdenbeath Junction to Kelty). From 2 June 1890, a completely new main line opened which left the existing NB Dunfermline to Thornton line at a point named Cowdenbeath Junction (later renamed Cowdenbeath South Junction) on the western margin of Cowdenbeath and headed north to join the existing Lumphinnans Junction to Kelty route at what was now called Kelty South Junction. Included with this new line was a railway station named Cowdenbeath (New), located just off the High Street and almost in the centre of Cowdenbeath itself . The NBR renamed this original station Cowdenbeath (Old) as from 1 June 1890 and it remained open for passenger traffic until 31 March 1919 and from then on until 1 January 1968 for goods traffic only. These dates are per the late D.M.Lindsay’s NBR Chronology. Cowdenbeath (Old) survived in use for miners’ work trains for a period after its closure in 1919 to ordinary passenger traffic. These miners’ trains appear in the Working Timetables and typically ran from Dunfermline Upper station to Kelty via Lumphinnans Junction in the early morning (around 6 am) with a return working in the mid afternoon after the end of the day shift at the various pits. Quick mentions that an engine based at Kelty worked miners’ trains which called here long after public closure’ and refers to Locomotives of the LNER: Part 8B’ and on page 66 of that work it is noted that ‘Dunfermline shed also numbered a dual-fitted J83 amongst its stock, No. 9831 [it became BR No. 68478] which in addition to the normal shunting and trip duties undertaken by the class at Kelty was also able to work short-distance passenger trains (provided for miners) calling at Cowdenbeath (Old) Station long after its closure to normal traffic...
Early 20th century railway developments in the area
Lumphinnans East and North Junctions
New loops were installed in April 1901 at both Lumphinnans East and Lumphinnans North Junctions on the line from Kelty South Junction. This line was in fact the original Kinross-shire Railway and until the recent construction of the Kelty Loop had been the only route northwards from west Fife (excluding the NB’s freight-only former West of Fife Mineral Railway which ran to the north-west of Dunfermline) to Kelty, Kinross and Milnathort.
Cowdenbeath Loop (see Map 1)
The original NB main line westwards from Lumphinnans Junction to Cowdenbeath (Old) and Cowdenbeath South Junction had, by the late 1890s, a number of separate colliery sidings, such as those serving the Donibristle colliery and the Raith pits of the Lochgelly Iron & Coal Co. (see Part 5 of this series in Journal No. 139) connected to it. In addition to these there was the Cowdenbeath gasworks siding and finally, the NB’s Kirkcaldy and District Railway opened in March 1896 and ran from Invertiel Junction near Kirkcaldy to Foulford Junction near Cowdenbeath.made a junction with the original main line at Foulford Junction. As a result of the growth of traffic to and from the various pits a diversionary route was built to allow through traffic to by-pass this congested section of the original route. The new line (named the Cowdenbeath Loop on large scale OS maps) ran eastwards from Cowdenbeath North Junction (which lay north of Cowdenbeath (New) station) to Lumphinnans Central Junction, where it joined the original main line from Thornton and Lochgelly. Today, the Cowdenbeath Loop remains open for traffic on the Fife Circle trains. The opening date for this new line was January 1900 and this is given on page 106 of Thornton railway days; edited Lillian King (Windfall Books: 2000). Several other writers state that the Loop was opened to traffic in March 1919 but:
• The Cowdenbeath Loop is first shown on Sheet 40 (Kinross) of the 1 inch to 1 mile OS map revised in 1903/04 and published in 1906;
• It is also shown on the Sheet XXXIVNE of the 6 inch to 1 mile OS map revised in 1913 and published in 1920.
I suggest that the date of March 1919 was that from which all passenger traffic in the area heading either east to Thornton Junction or west to Dunfermline was re-routed via the Cowdenbeath Loop and Cowdenbeath (New) station. The Cowdenbeath (Old) station had closed to passenger traffic as from 31 March 1919 and what had been the original main line (between Lumphinnans Central Junction and Cowdenbeath South Junction) was now used mainly for freight traffic but

John McGregor. The lost Esplanade. 38-43
The first serious attempt to reach Fort William, by the the Fort William Railway (1862) would have diverged from the Inverness & Perth Junction at Etteridge (Glen Truim) or Newtonmore, running by Loch Laggan and Glen Spean. Thomas Bouch made a preliminary survey; but he could not persuade the landowners who had commissioned him that they must seek outside capital to supplement their own slender resources. The Glasgow & North Western Railway, a bill for which was lodged in 1882-3 was a highly ambitious and blatantly speculative failed becuse the landowners were not prepared to allow railway construction on their land. The engineer for this line was Thomas Walrond-Smith. The West Highland Railway was more fortunate in that the Napier Commission Report in 1884 had prepared the way for a railway to Fort William and onward to an Atlantic port at Roshven with the prospect of Treasury assistance. The route from Craigendoran to Fort William was engineered by Charles Forman, was approved in 1889 and opened in 1894. It is treated here very much as a fait accompli. The promoters carefully disciplined their parliamentary presentation; before their Bill came to Parliament, they obtained the North British Company’s promise of a guarantee and working agreement; and they secured declarations of support, or at worst neutrality, from every major proprietor along the route. Moreover, both public and parliamentary opinion was broadly sympathetic. A 30-mile extension to Loch Ailort (which the North British did not include in their guarantee), together with a new harbour at Roshven, was added to the West Highland Bill — and by so doing the promoters staked a claim for subsidy. Though the West Highland’s Roshven arm was rejected in the House of Lords, the Commons Committee concluded that the proposed line to Fort William was justified, both on its own merits and as a step towards a third railhead on the west coast, supplementing Oban and Strome Ferry. The Highland Company, and the Caledonian too, miscalculated their opposition — they had expected the West Highland Bill to fail comprehensively on the vexed question of government aid, and were slow to realise how far the North British were already committed.
This article's main thrust is on the Fort William terminus and a possible link to the pier by a tramway, thus creating an esplanade.
There is some suggestion that the North British sought primarily to intersect the Callander & Oban, at the same time pre-empting any independently promoted cut-off to Crianlarich which might pass into Caledonian hands. A railway onwards from Crianlarich and across Rannoch Moor into Lochaber was in itself a dubious proposition. But running powers to Oban might not be granted, and Fort William offered a tempting bridgehead at which to ‘wait and see’, pending further advance — whether to Inverness by the Great Glen, as most commentators expected, or to the west coast, if government support were first assured. To forestall the former became the Highland Company’s priority. Judging the battle lost when the West Highland Bill, shorn of Roshven, passed the House of Lords, they negotiated the Great Glen Agreement, or ‘Ten Years Truce’ and ceased their opposition in the Commons (where the Caledonian fought on to defend Oban). By this Great Glen treaty, any extension of the West Highland towards Inverness was postponed for a decade after the commencement of traffic to Fort William. One more point must be made. The Callander & Oban Company, worked at cost by the Caledonian, enjoyed a meaningful measure of autonomy; but the West Highland became, almost from the outset, ‘the North British by another name’, and the promoters’ early pledges to their supporters, all along the route, lay at the discretion of their paymaster-patron.
As authorised in 1889, the West Highland would have entered Fort William through crofting land along the River Lochy, crossing the River Nevis on a causeway to reach the old fort, the prospective site of the passenger station. A new seawall along Loch Linnhe was to carry a connecting tramway to the town pier; and, on the understanding that this would remain a tramway, the burgh commissioners framed an enthusiastic petition-in-favour. They expected to obtain an open promenade-cum-carriage drive behind the seawall, with tramway traffic limited to an unobtrusive shuttle, linking station and steamers. Edinburgh solicitors MacRae, Flett & Rennie, the principal agents for the promoters and subsequently for the West Highland Company, made no commitment in so many words but they gave every assurance that the ‘interests of Fort William’ would be kept in view. The fort was acquired by Campbell of Monzie, whose wife, Christina Cameron, had inherited the Lochaber estate of Callart and was feudal superior of the burgh and later she made over the fort site to the West Highland Company. Forman acknowledged that, in taking the West Highland across Rannoch Moor and down Loch Treig into the Spean valley, he had copied the drove-road proposed by Thomas Telford at the beginning of the 19th century.
During the interval, when it seemed that the Callander & Oban might halt permanently at Tyndrum, narrow-gauge feeder lines had been suggested, both from Oban and from Lochaber. One such was the Fort William, Ballachulish & Tyndrum Railway (1874), running by Glen Coe. This probably speculative scheme had progressed to a notice of intent — only to fade away when standard-gauge construction onwards to Oban was resumed. It would have terminated at Fort William pierhead, half-a-mile from the fort, entailing only the demolition of decayed property in the town’s west end.
The railway was  almost complete and ready for inspection, but the terminus problem remained unresolved and the Board of Trade inpector was r equested to intervene. This was Major Marindin and his methods marked a great advance since those of Pasley mentioned elsewhere in this Issue. With nothing resolved, Forman departed to accompany Marindin on his end-to-end, week-long (and prospectively final) examination of the West Highland line. MacPhee was sent in pursuit with amended proposals but returned empty-handed. Though he had found engineer and inspector at Tyndrum, they were preoccupied by an accident in which the fireman of a ballast train had been fatally injured. On the evening of Monday, 9 July the inspection party reached Fort William – and that very afternoon the President of the Board of Trade, facing questions in the House of Commons, had promised mediation. In consequence, a telegram awaited Marindin at the Alexandra Hotel – he must use his best endeavours to bring town and railway company to a new accord. Provost Young and town clerk Fraser, with MacPhee in attendance, presented themselves that night ‘at half past ten o’clock’, to request that Forman resume negotiations there and then. Not unreasonably, the engineer declined.
During Tuesday Marindin examined the entire layout at Fort William. He also revisited the line along Glen Spean, where the stations at Inverlair, Roy Bridge and Spean Bridge had received only brief attention the previous day. On Wednesday he heard both the commissioners’ submission and Forman’s counter-argument. The inspector’s verdict, announced on his return to London, showed careful balance (or skilful fence-sitting?). Without condemning the pierhead station, he judged the old fort the better site. Acknowledging that Fort William had been deceived, he proposed to interpret the town’s protection clause generously, in respect of public passage across and alongside the seawall line. But he also pronounced that a tramway as first intended could not have been made compatible with the open promenade-cum-carriage drive which the commissioners still cherished. He would have prescribed thorough fencing, or imposed restrictions severely limiting public access.
In his own mind, Marindin had resolved not to pass the barely finished West Highland for traffic before his task was two-thirds done – his interim memorandum to this effect was written at Tyndrum. However, he hinted that he would be indulgent in everything not absolutely required for safety on his re-inspection a few weeks later. Though it proved a very near thing, on Friday, 3 August he declared the line ready. With Fort William and Lochaber determined to celebrate, the foreshore quarrel was for the moment set aside. Opening day saw a double celebration in that the West Highland Mallaig Extension had just secured Parliament’s approval – though the Treasury’s input had yet to be confirmed. Thus the foreshore dispute would be resumed in a new context, which also included the collapse and precarious reinstatement (1894-5) of the Great Glen Agreement. And the terms eventually accepted by the Fort William commissioners in 1896 would be bound up with the West Highland Ballachulish Extension, authorised that same year but never to be begun. These are matters for another article.

Grant Cullen.  The North British Railway and the Great War: organisation, efforts, difficulties and cchievements. 44-8
When, shortly after the outbreak of the war in August 1914 and the successful despatch of the first Divisions of the British Expeditionary Force to France, it became obvious that railways were to play a part of primary importance in the development of the conflict, that the war, in fact, was to be a "Railway War". More than four years later British railways had accomplished, as a result of their activities which had taxed their energies and resources to the utmost extent, and had exercised a considerable influence on the movements and achievements of the British forces, if not on the actual course and outcome of the war itself.
The construction of railways, in time of peace, to serve the purposes of war, offensive or defensive, was first advocated in Germany in the 1830s, becoming that country’s policy, although the need for organisation, directed to the provision for the building, repair, destruction and working of railways and for the regulation of military traffic in general under war-time conditions was not fully realised in Europe until after the American Civil War of 1861-1865. In 1866 Prussia established a Field Railway Section (Feldeisenbahnabteilung) which was eventually to develop into a comprehensive scheme of preparation for war by organising every possible phase of military rail-transport and leaving nothing to chance that could be foreseen and provided for in advance.
With the eastern part of its system stretching along the shores of the North Sea from Berwick-upon-Tweed to Aberdeen; with its trunk lines radiating from Edinburgh to Carlisle, Perth, Stirling, Glasgow, Fort William and Mallaig and with its direct connection with the further north of Scotland and the railways of England, through its association with the Highland Railway at Perth, its partnership with the Great Northern and the North Eastern in the East Coast Route between London (King’s Cross) and Scotland, its cooperation with the Midland in respect of the Waverley Route, via Carlisle, Galashiels and Edinburgh, the North British Railway came into immediate prominence as one of the vital means of communications in Great Britain for the purposes of The Great War.
There were, however, various special reasons that arose, which tended still more to accentuate that fact. It was considered then that it was quite within the range of possibilities that an invasion of the country by the enemy might be attempted on the East Coast of Scotland. Hence the NBR was called upon in the earliest of days to convey to their appointed destinations the troops to be amassed for defensive purposes along the coast. Many military training centres were, also, set up within convenient distances of NBR lines, their location being, no doubt, inspired to a certain extent by the idea of having more men available in case the enemy should attempt a landing. Much of this fear of invasion, particularly amongst the general populace, had been driven in the early 1900s by a series of ‘spy’ novels, the best known of which was ‘The Riddle of the Sands’ by Erskine Childers (Childers subsequently lost his life in the Irish Civil War in November 1922). As described in its author’s own words, Riddle of the Sands was written as ‘... a story with a purpose’ written from ‘a patriot’s natural sense of duty’, which predicted war with Germany and called for British preparedness. The whole genre of ‘invasion novels’ raised the public‘s awareness of the ‘potential threat’ of Imperial Germany. Although a belief has grown that the book was responsible for the development of the naval base at Rosyth, the novel was published in May 1903, two months after the purchase of the land for the Rosyth naval base was announced in Parliament (5 March 1903) and some time after secret negotiations for the purchase. The first Railway Executive Committee was constituted as follows. Sir Frank Ree (LNWR); (later Sir) Herbert Walker, London & South Western; Sir Guy Granet (Midland); Mr. F. Potter (Great Western); (later Sir) A. Kaye Butterworth (North Eastern); (later Sir) J A F Aspinall (Lancashire and Yorkshire); Sir Sam Fay (Great Central); Oliver R. H. Bury (Great Northern) and Donald A. Matheson (Caledonian). Matheson was in fact representing the North British Railway, the Highland Railway and the Great North of Scotland Railway, in addition to the Caledonian. The North British Railway remained as the ‘Railway Secretary Company’ for Scotland. Matheson had held the rank of Major in the Engineer and Railway Volunteer Staff Corps from July 1900. That the NBR acquiesced in this appointment was testament to improved relations between the NBR and ‘The Caley’ during the early years of the 20th century. The first Secretary of the Executive Committee, under Sir Frank Ree, was L W Horne, later Superintendent of the Line of the LNWR. Sir Frank Ree died suddenly on February 13th 1914 with Herbert Walker being appointed in his place. The Committee adopted for their headquarters the Westminster offices of the LNWR on Parliament Street, London and here, prior to July 1914, they had had six meetings.
The peace-time preparations of the Executive Committee further included the provision of means by which it could rely, in time of war, upon being in direct communications with the leading centres of railway communications. At first a system of wireless telegraphy was projected, but this was abandoned in favour of telephone installation. Under the direction of the Government, the Post Office authorities supplemented their ordinary London and trunk line services by providing a system of telephone wires between the Executive Committee’s offices in Westminster and all the railway termini in London, together with the general offices of the Midland Railway in Derby, the North Eastern at York and the Lancashire and Yorkshire at Manchester. Inasmuch as each centre of railway administration itself controlled a telephonic system . This comprehensive system of telephones, which was to play an extremely important part indeed in the working of the organisation was completed only the very week before the declaration of war
Sources
Official History of the Great War (Francis Edmonds) Vol. 1, 1923, originally published by Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence. Reprinted by Naval and Military Press 2013. KPJ: note not Edmunds as per article: checked with York University OPAC
British Railways and the Great War (Pratt) Vol 1, originally published by Selwyn and Blount, Ltd. Available in the Classic Reprint Series of Forgotten Books. Also available to view online at https://archive.org/ details/cu31924092566128/page/ n6/mode/2up
An unappreciated field of endeavour: logistics and the British Expeditionary Force on the Western Front 1914-1918 (Clem Maginnis). Helion: 2018. Illustrations:

Part 2 will be ‘War! State Control Applied – Mobilisation’ covering the full extent of their own lines, the facilities afforded to the Executive Committee for communications with every part of the country were exceptionally great.

[J37 0-6-0 No. 64582 with train of 20 bulks (Leith General Warehousing grain wagons) near Morningside Road]. Stuart Sellar. 48
Photograph: Caption suggests train may have been en route from Thomas Bernard's maltings at South Leith to T. & J. Bernard's Brewery next to Gorgie East station in 1950s. See Issue 141 page 3

Allan Rodgers. The Scotsman vans of the NBR – a follow-up. 49-52
Following publication of previous article on the Scotsman newspaper vans, which appeared in Journal 139, Study Group member Jim Hay got in touch. It turns out Jim has a 7mm model of one of these vans, in NBR livery, originally built many years ago by Sir Eric Hutchison, who, it will be recalled, wrote the article on the Scotsman vans which appeared in the November 1945 issue of Model Railway News. Much of the information I had included on the 1890s six wheeled vans was based on the information contained in Sir Eric’s article; so, the existence of a model built by him was clearly a source of new information about the livery of these vans as running in NBR days. So much so, that I decided a follow-up article was required to include amended illustrations of the 1890s vans showing the NBR livery I now believe they carried, based on scrutiny of Sir Eric’s model.
Illustrations (all except on from Model Railway News in colour).

Stewart Noble Where was Helensburgh’s first railway station? 53-8
The short answer is that Helensburgh is where it was first located in 1858, that is adjacent to the  corner of Sinclair Street and East Princes Street. References to a station in George Street probably relate to a ticket platform where returning commuters left the train and joined their horse-draewn transport. A report by Major Marindin in 1892 is used to justify the permanence of the original terminus station, rather than assertions made by the author elsewhere. 

Operating the Caledonian Railway Andrew Boyd reviews a recent two-volume work by Jim Summers. 59
At first sight the review of a two-volume work about the Caledonian Railway must surely have no place in a Journal devoted to the NBR, so why has the Editor been prevailed upon to allow its inclusion? The answer is that they provide an excellent insight into how a major railway of that era functioned and was managed and operated. Every railway was different and each had its own management structures and methods of conducting business. However they all faced similar challenges and were all subject to the same statutory and regulatory requirements. They had to co-operate with other, often competing, companies. They exchanged traffic, complied with Railway Clearing House accounting and other obligations, managed joint lines and stations, exercised running powers over the lines of other companies and had to accommodate the running powers exercised by other companies. Students of the North British Railway will therefore find here much to interest and inform them, not least in comparing CR practice with that of other companies. Such comparisons were not always unfavourable to the NBR. Although written in an engaging style, the author has applied a professional perspective to his subject. He is well qualified to do so as in his working life he was a career railwayman who occupied senior positions within BR management. Apart from his current role as vice-chairman of the Caledonian Railway Association and as a railway modeller of some standing, he is also a member of our Group, well known to many of us. The contents encompass most aspects of managing and operating the railway. These range from the structure of top management and the duties of various grades of staff to the classification and loading of trains, operation of marshalling yards and hazards of shunting; and from the timetabling and operation of the Royal Train to the running of suburban and workman’s trains and the handling of mail, parcels, goods, mineral and livestock traffic. Amongst the aspects covered are what the author nicely describes as getting on with the neighbours; arguments with traders about demurrage charges; operation of slip carriages; timetable preparation; and the operation of a selection of principal stations including the joint station at Perth. He also covers the investigations made into the feasibility of electrifying the Glasgow Central Low Level lines in the early years of the last century and Donald Matheson’s examination of US practice in relation to coal wagons and shipment. The latter issue was one of considerable financial relevance to railways such as the CR (and NBR) that were major coal carriers.
As with his previously published book on signalling the present volumes are copiously illustrated.
The comparisons with other companies are particularly useful. In a chapter on organisation, the author explores the role of Superintendent and his duties. In 1916 the CR was, as the author puts it, ‘tinkering’ and beginning to use the term Superintendent of the Line, while around the same time the NBR was also considering its own organisation but more fundamentally. Two posts emerged on the NBR in 1917, namely an Operating Superintendent (Major Charles H Stemp), and a Commercial Superintendent, evidencing the NBR’s decision to formalise the split between commercial matters and the running of trains.
No doubt with the eye of a professional railwayman the author discusses the compilation and layout of the General and Sectional Appendix to the Working Timetables. The Appendix had become a crucial document for those operating the railway yet the CR’s final issue in 1915 was in his words ‘a weighty, inconvenient hotchpotch‘ whereas the NBR’s approach was more progressive, not allowing the imminent grouping deflect it from issuing in 1922 a ‘modern edition’ of its Appendix. He commends the innovations introduced by the NB and speculates what the CR might have adopted had it remained independent. As it was the CR contented itself with issuing in 1921 ‘an unenterprising traditional Supplement… to its hefty Appendix of 1915’.
In his chapter on Control the author notes that despite the challenges faced by the CR in operating its congested main line over Beattock and in handling the intense mineral traffic in Lanarkshire, it was the NBR which at Portobello in 1913 pioneered in Scotland the notion of a control office. Reference to these instances is not of course to suggest that the author fails to commend the CR when appropriate nor that he fails to compare the CR favourably with the practice of other companies when justified but these do illustrate the objective approach adopted by the author. Amongst the examples of the working relationships which necessarily arose between the CR and the NBR two instances may be mentioned. An edited version of an article by David Stirling first published in the SRPS magazine ‘Blastpipe’ describes the conflict between the two companies over the rebuilding by the NBR of the swing bridge carrying its Stirlingshire Midland Junction railway over the Forth & Clyde Canal. The CR had to resort to litigation to force the NBR’s hand over this issue but eventually an agreement was reached to enable work to proceed. While the line was closed for work to be done, extensive diversion of trains operated by both companies had to take place, often entailing reversals at Greenhill, Polmont and Grangemouth Junction.
A few years later an unplanned line closure resulted from a vessel colliding with the CR’s Forth Bridge at Alloa in October 1904. The line, used by the trains of both companies (as the NBR exercised running powers over it) was closed until June 1905. Co-operation resulted in the institution of a service of three CR passenger trains each way over the NBR route between Alloa and Stirling and the conveyance of CR passengers and traffic on two evening NBR trains each way on the same route. These two volumes are thoroughly recommended to all those who wish to learn more about how railways were managed and operated in the days when companies like the NBR and the CR were in business.

Macmerry Station. 60 (rear  cover)
Macmerry had quite a simple layout, but did include a run-round loop and two sidings (one with a crane), together with a passenger platform long enough for an engine and a few coaches. The branch on the eastern side of the station, diverging to the south of the map extract and heading roughly north-east on the lower right hand part of the extract, was a mineral railway serving Merryfield, Bald, Dander and Engine Pits to the north of what is now the A1 road. Extracted from Ordnance Survey 25 inch Map of Haddingtonshire IX.11. Publication date 1894, revised 1892.

View, taken at Craigentinny, is almost certainly an official posed photograph shows NBR ‘Scott’ class locomotive No. 340 Lady of Avenel with an ambulance train

No. 141 (December 2020)

From our Archives. 3.
Photograph of employees at St. Margarets pose in front of 4-4-2T locomotive No. 450 (later LNER Class C16). The only name that is recorded is that of William Dowie, the fitter on the right. He was the son of a driver, Sam Dowie. The photograph, from the Hennigan collection,is credited to W Dowie. Included in the photograph with the relatively youthful employees are various items including a buffer, a brake block, and – on the trestles to the right – what is possibly one of the valve rods with its pistons. In the right foreground, the barrels probably contain supplies of lubricating oil.

An apology from the Editor. 3.
Shortly after Journal 140 was published, with the photograph on the left on page 48, Stuart Sellar contacted us. He had immediately recognised the picture of the J37 and train, which was taken by him on 13 June 1955 approaching Morningside Road. The train from South Leith was heading for either Gorgie or Cameron Bridge. He tells us that it is credited to the ‘Hennigan Collection’ because he sent Willie anything of North British interest that he had taken, or older prints that had emerged from retired railwaymen. He expressed surprise that Willie had not acknowledged the source. This was not an omission by the late Mr Hennigan – it was an error on the part of your editor, for which he apologises. The Group’s photo archive shows Stuart Sellar to be the photographer and we are happy to set the record straight

Euan Cameron. The Reid ‘Scott’ class 4-4-0s. 4-19.
Became LNER classes D29 and D30. At the end of 1908 the NBR Locomotive Committee received designs for new locomotives, including a new bogie passenger design. It was agreed that six would be ordered initially from outside contractors. On 28 January 1909 a contract was made with North British Locomotive Company to supply six four-coupled passenger engines at a cost of £3,290 each. In the summer of 1910, the Board discussed ordering more of the engines, and eventually agreed that ten more engines would be built at Cowlairs. Numbers for these, taken from engines assigned to the duplicate list, were agreed on 15 June 1911. The same price was stipulated for the in-house engines as for the contractor-built ones. The engines thus ordered entered service between September and December of 1911.
Meanwhile, during 1910-11 the Board had already been discussing the possibility of building engines with superheated boilers. In February 1911 it was resolved that two Scott class locomotives would be built with superheated boilers. These were numbers 400 and 363, approved in early 1912, but not built until the autumn of that year, at a cost of £5,980 (presumably for the pair). In 1914 approval was given for 15 more superheated Scotts to be built at a total cost of £45,47. A further five were authorized and built in 1915, and a final five in 1920. The N.B.R. paid royalties on the use of the Robinson superheater apparatus on condition that no other types were used on new construction.
The planning and construction of new 4-4-0 locomotives was under discussion from 1909 to 1920: the 6-ft 6-in wheeled Scotts or the Intermediates and Glens with 6-ft 0-in wheels. Large numbers of older locomotives were being withdrawn, and the need for more powerful passenger engines to work trains with heavier bogie carriages was pressing.
The 1909 Scotts as first built (the 895 Class)
The first saturated Scott engines were, in effect, versions of the 317 4.4.0s of 1903, later L. N. E. R. class D26 namely 4-4-0s with 3-ft 6-in bogie wheels and 6-ft 6-in driving wheels   and 19-in x 26-in cylinders set on a plane inclined upwards from the driving axles to the smokebox. The cylinders were regulated by outside admission 8-in diameter piston valves on a plane inclined downwards from the driving axles towards the front, driven directly by Stephenson’s Link valve gear which was reversed by a steam reverser just inboard of the mainframes on the driver’s side. All these features were essentially shared between the 317 and 895 (later D29) classes. The General Arrangement for the 895 class was Cowlairs drawing 3090: with annotation stating it was copied from NBL drawing 1 of Order L344 (though various notes mentioned minute differences between the NBL and Cowlairs examples). This drawing is 12748 in the NRM’s series of Oxford Publishing Co. drawings.
The steam reverser was an interesting piece of equipment, though it seems that the engine crews never settled to it as did enginemen on other railways where it was more common, such as the Glasgow and South Western or the South Eastern and Chatham Railways. It comprised a vertically aligned steam cylinder mounted with a shared piston rod above a cylinder of hydraulic fluid: actuating the reversing lever opened a bypass valve for the lower chamber, allowing a piston inside it to move freely, while it also admitted steam to either the top or the bottom of the steam cylinder, moving an arm aligned with the bottom of the lifting links of the valve gear down or up. Attached to that lifting arm was a bearing, with a slender vertical rod attached, which acted on a bell-crank to transmit the position of the valve gear to an indicator visible to the crew in the cab. Both the control and indicator rods were of quite light material.
The most obvious difference from the 317s was the much larger boiler, with a 5-ft 0-in diameter barrel made up of two butt-jointed plates, pitched 8-ft 2½-in above rail level. This larger boiler also necessitated a wider cab than had been common before that point, of 6-ft 10-in outside width and with sidesheets 7-ft 5-in high. The boiler and cab were fundamentally the same as those on the second series of Intermediates or 331 class (LNER class D33) which were being built around the same time, except obviously for the larger splashers on the Scotts
Superheated Scott design of 1912
Nos. 400 and 363, the first Scotts to be built superheated, represented a departure in front-end design for the NBR. The 20-in x 26-in cylinders were aligned horizontally with the plane of the axles. Iinside admission 8-in piston valves were set in parallel to the cylinders but 1-ft 8¼-in above the centre line. The piston valves were (steam being admitted in the mid-space between the two ends of the valve, rather than at the outer ends of the valve chamber) and consequently the action of the Stephenson’s valve gear was reversed through rocking shafts attached to the front of the motion plate. The valve gear used shorter eccentric rods than those on the saturated engines (4-ft 6-in centres rather than 4-ft 10-in). Unlike all other members of the class, Nos. 400 and 363 were fitted with the same design of steam reverser as on the saturated Scotts. Moreover, for some reason these engines retained their steam reversing gear much longer than the rest. No. 9400 was photographed still equipped in 1935, and No. 9363 in 1938.
Fitting piston valves above the cylinders required the boiler to be 3½" higher than on the saturated engines. The superheated locomotives required more lubrication and had large Wakefield mechanical lubricators fitted on a pedestal on the right-hand side of the running plate, which derived motion from a complex set of adjustable levers from the valve gear. No. 400 was also fitted with a superheater damper on the right-hand side of the smokebox, but this was soon removed.  Both engines had snifting valves in the smokebox waist: which protruded directly out from the smokebox, whereas on later examples they were attached to an elbow joint and pointed downwards. The boilers on 400 and 363 differed in detail from those on later versions of the class. As built the first two had Schmidt Superheaters with long return elements, as opposed to the Robinson short loop superheaters used on the examples built from 1914. The first two boilers also had the smaller design of Reid dome, as fitted to the 895 class. These and other differences caused the first two locomotives to be classified D30/1 by the LNER at first, though subsequent exchanges of boilers between different members of the class made the part numbers redundant, and they were later abandoned. The official boiler pressure of the engines built superheated was 165 psi, though it is not clear whether the lower pressure was retained consistently.
The cabs were slightly wider than those on the 1909 Scotts, at 6-ft 11-in wide, and the sidesheets were ½-in shorter in height, differences which would be perpetuated on the very similar Glen class. Notwithstanding these adjustments, there was insufficient space for the traditional circular spectacle windows on the front of the cab, so a rectangular window, with part of the rectangle cut in to accommodate the boiler, was fitted instead.
Production Scotts of 1914-1920
The 25 engines of the main sequence of superheated ‘Scotts’ were built in three batches of fifteen, five, and five over a seven-year period, but as built the locomotives were very similar. Cowlairs General Arrangement drawing 4289B described them (12765 in the NRM’s series of Oxford Publishing Co. drawings). The basic layout of the locomotives was identical to the first two, but the production versions had 10-in diameter piston valves, and the steam reverser was replaced by horizontal screw reversing gear in the cab, acting on a vertical arm attached to a weighshaft just ahead of the splashers near the top of the frames. The boilers all had Robinson short-loop superheaters with 24 flues, and the anti-vacuum valves were of the pepper-pot type attached to an elbow joint just above the frames on the smokebox. Reid’s larger diameter dome was fitted. One divergence from the first two locomotives was that the main series of Scotts, possibly up to and including No. 498, were initially fitted with pyrometers, fitted to the right-hand side of the smokebox just below and to the rear of the chimney, and manifested as a prominent short pipe protruding upwards, connected to a long narrow tube leading back to the cab, but were soon removed'
All these locomotives were fitted with both Westinghouse and Vacuum brake from new. Overall, the Scotts shared in the very robust, solid construction typical of Reid’s designs at this period, where nearly every structural component was made just a little larger and heavier than had been the case in Holmes’s time.
Changes to the D29s in service
Older NB locomotives typically underwent rebuilding at 20-25 years old, but did not happen to the engines built new by W.P. Reid. However, multiple important alterations were made to the classes under the LNER. Charting the sequence of these changes is not straightforward: they were not carried out at the same time, although in the case of the D29 Class they were generally done in a consistent order. Sometimes two changes were done at the same visit to the works, though never all three at once. The dates of the following changes are supplied in the data list at the end of this article.
1. Replacement of the steam reverser with a screw reverse
The steam reversers were marked for removal relatively early on, between 1925 and 1931. A new weighshaft was fitted in more or less the same position as on the D30 Class, and it was actuated by a reach rod which, unusually, ran outside the boiler for all its length until it entered a fairing just in front of the cab, where it was worked by a circular handle on a large screw thread. When the weighshaft was moved to the top of the frames, the downward extension of the mainframes which had housed the former weighshaft bearing was cut away. This reversing arrangement was the same as that used to modify the D32 and D33 Intermediates, though the larger wheels of the D29 required the reach rod to be cranked slightly near the front and the reverser itself to be set approximately 5-in highe
2. Fitting of superheated boilers
This alteration probably made the most dramatic difference to the performance, as well as the appearance, of the D29s. All were superheated between 1925 and 1936. A new General Arrangement was prepared, Cowlairs No. 5385B, 12810 in the NRM series of Oxford Publishing Co. drawings. The drawing is however a trap for the unwary, in that it shows the superheated engines still with steam reversers, a condition in which none of the D29s ever ran. The new boilers were effectively the same as those on the D30s, and indeed boilers were regularly interchanged, not only between the two classes of Scotts, but also with the superheated Intermediates and Glens. New smokeboxes were fitted, which extended the smokebox interior lengthwise by 7-in. The chimneys were moved forward by 5-in to accommodate the superheater headers at the rear of the smokebox. Generally, the D29s continued to be rated for 190 psi boiler pressure after superheating (as was also the case with the Intermediates) making them theoretically more powerf ul than their more modern D30 counterparts even though the latter had an extra inch on the cylinder diameter. It would seem that, having had a somewhat doubtful reputation as saturated engines, the D29/2s were regarded as good engines once superheated.
3. Replacement of the Westinghouse Brake with Steam/Vacuum brake
The removal of Westinghouse brake equipment was the last change to be made, generally in the mid-1930s in keeping with LNER policy for all but those engines already deemed obsolete (such as the D31 4-4-0s, which went to the scrap lines with their Westinghouse compressors still in place). When the air brakes were removed from the Reid 4-4-0s the clasp brakes, which had been actuated by the compressed air cylinders between the front and rear drivers, were abolished and a cylinder under the cab acted on brake shoes in front of the wheels only. The locomotives then had vacuum brake for the train, permanently linked to a steam brake cylinder for the locomotive only.
4. Experiments
Two experimental pieces of apparatus were fitted to saturated Scotts in NBR days. Some time after March 1911, No. 897 was fitted with the Phoenix Superheater equipment. This device was essentially a steam dryer, which exposed the steam from the boiler to additional heat in the extended smokebox. It had been illustrated in the Engineering press in 1910 and aroused enough interest for the L.B. & S.C.R. also to fit it to B4 4-4-0 No. 59 in 1912. It was not a success, and late in 1912 the NBR Board resolved not to continue with it. A sectional model of the equipment may be seen online at the Science and Society Picture Library, image No. 10247245. With less fanfare, No. 359 was fitted with a Weir feedwater heater and feed pump on the left-hand side of the footplate. This appears to have been done in early 1914; the company decided later in the year to continue to use it, but not to buy any more examples. It was removed from No. 359 before Grouping.
Details
The saturated Scotts lost their smokebox wingplates fairly promptly as the fashion for removing these took hold on the NBR. The following engines are believed to have lost their wingplates before 1923: 899, 244, 338, 360, 362. All the remainder had them removed between 1923 and 1925. No. 897 was exceptional in that it retained its wingplates for a spell while repainted in LNER. green. These numerous locomotives, regularly changing boilers, accumulated a huge number of minor detail variations over the years. Space precludes listing them all, and those intending to model a particular example should always check with photographs.
Some superheated D29s had multi-feed hydrostatic lubricators in the cab, feeding the valves and other lubrication points through an array of small pipes down the right-hand side of the boiler.

Stephen Woodhouse. Steaming ahead – the NBR's contribution to freight traffic in 1921. 18-21
In 1969 the Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers published a paper by B.J. Turton, then an economic geographer at the University of Keele, analysing British railway traffic in 1921. This article extracts the data provided for the NBR and compares it to the other Scottish railway companies and the main constituents of the LNER. Turton’s figures give us a picture of the importance of the NBR and subsequently the LNER in railway freight at the time.
Turton’s information source was the Railway Traffic Returns made by each railway company to the Board of Trade. These enabled him to provide a representative pattern of freight movements to be established in the immediate aftermath of WW1, when the British railway network was at its maximum extent both in terms of the services operated and when the railways carried the higher proportion of both passenger and freight traffic. The motor car and motor lorry had yet to achieve dominance. Tables show how NBR compared with other Scottish Railways and  with other British railways in terms of freight conveyed. Coal dominated NBR activity, but haulage tended to be very short-haul. The NBR was clearly the largest and busiest of the Scottish companies in 1921 with just over one third of the route length and nearly half the freight tonnage; it was also a significant component of the LNER with 22% of the route length but only 17% of the traffic; its significance is underlined by the NBR providing its Chairman. Statistics include traffic densities

Steve Chambers. On a plate. 22-4
Locomtuve works plates. While worksplates are a useful way to identify individual engines, there are pitfalls, especially when we study a company whose numbering system for new engines swayed between the capital and revenue accounts according to the accounting convenience of the moment. Who would have thought there might be different engines with the same number (photo captioners of N15s and Y9s beware). In the past I can remember visiting industrial or colliery sites to find the remains of some rusting steam locos. The received wisdom was always ‘check the worksplates, if they’re still on the engine. That’ll tell you what it is’. Well, maybe

Grant Cullen, The North British Railway and the Great War: organisation, efforts, difficulties and achievements. Part 2: War! State control applied – mobilisation. 25-9
Mechanisms had to be eastbished for conveying large numbers of troops and their horses and equipment to the ports of embarkation which coúld be as far away as Southampton and involve several railways. This required liaison with the army and with the government and the Railway Executive Committee was a key component. The composition of Railway Executive Committee was:
• D.A. Matheson – Caledonian Railway
• Sir Sam Fay – Great Central Railway
• C,H. Dent – Great Northern Railway
• F. Potter – Great Western Railway
• Sir Robert Turnbull – London & North Western Railway
• J.A.F. Aspinall – Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway
• H,A. Walker – London & South Western Railway
• Sir Guy Granet – Midland Railway
• Sir A.K. Butterworth – North Eastern Railway
• F.H. Dent – South Eastern & Chatham Railway
The Railway Secretary to the Committee was Gilbert S. Szlumper
One departure amongst the hundreds from Waverley station during the war of men bound for the conflict has been touched on in two books – Jack Alexander's 16th Battalion of the Royal Scots – McCrae’s Battalion (Mainstream Publishing; 2004) and Tom Purdie's Hearts at War 1914-1919 (Amberley Publishing, 2014). Sir George McCrae was a self-made Edinburgh businessman, who made his mark in the drapery trade. He became a member of Edinburgh Council in 1889. He was the City Treasurer and Chairman of the Finance Committee from 1891-1899 and also served as a Justice of the Peace. From 1899 he  was MP for Edinburgh East, but in 1909 he resigned from the House of Commons to take up a senior position in Scottish government service as Vice-President of the Local Government Board. He mounted a vociferous campaign began against the continuance of professional football during a time of national crisis and, in particular, the fact that the players themselves were not leading the campaign by volunteering to serve. In November 1914 he was permitted to form the 16th Battalion of the Royal Scots and encouraged players and supporters of Hearts to join.
On 1 July 1916, the 15th and 16th Battalions of the Royal Scots attacked near the village of Contalmaison in the Somme Valley. Three Hearts players would die that day, seven would be killed in total during the war, and many more would be wounded. In 2004 just south of Contalmaison village a Memorial was erected to commemorate McCrae’s Battalion, the 16th Battalion of the Royal Scots. It has since become a place of pilgrimage for football supporters and Edinburgh schoolchildren.
Against this background it is not surprising that many railway sought to enlist and the General Manager Fulton attempted to intervene, but many released enlisted again.
The NBR supplied an ambulance train, but its system of suspended cots did not meet with approval, but when the United States entered the War it was found useful to convey casualties from Fort Edgar to Wemyss Bay to hand them over to the US Navy. Illustrations:

Alan Simpson. West Fife pits and the NBR: Part 7 — Some smaller coalowners in the Cowdenbeath Area. 30-4.
The collective name ‘Donibristle Colliery’ was used to describe a small group of coal pits lying south of the NB Thornton to Dunfermline line and south-west of the peat bog called Moss Morran and in Aberdour parish. The Donibristle pits were served by a private mineral line which was connected to the NB east of Cowdenbeath South Junction and ran southwards. (The name ‘Donibristle’ was the name of the landed estate on which the pits were situated and which covered the area from just south of Cowdenbeath to the Firth of Forth at Donibristle Bay. It is also the name of a village which lies just south of the present day Crossgates to Auchtertool highway.) Hill of Beath Colliery was the collective name for a small group of pits (see Map 3) to the west and north of Hill of Beath village

Stirling Everard. Cowlairs Commentary. 35-9
Reprinted from Locomotive Mag. of 15 April 1943. Cowlairs came into production in 1869 as the sole locomotive works for the Company. From that year until the end of Wheatley's time additional standard 17in. goods engines were turned out annually. The later machines had domed boilers. In all sixty-two were built by the company in addition to the twenty-six contract-built engines already mentioned. The final batch was completed after Wheatley had resigned. The numbers of the Cowlairs built engines were 12, 16, 23, 26, 31, 47, 48, 53, 54, 61, 64, 65, 69, 70, 71, 102, 114-122, 124, 126, 127, 129, 133, 142, 219, 243-246, 257, 266, 267, 275, 276, 283, 285, 291, 298, 307, 309, 407-417 and 450-453.
For mineral traffic he introduced a smaller variant of the design having 4ft. 0in. wheels and 16in. x 24in. cylinders, of which thirty-seven were built at Cowlairs. These were Nos. 1-6, 15, 25, 41, 43, 86, 152, 251-254, 265 and 430-449. Many engines of both types had cast-iron wheels with T-section spokes which he particularly favoured for goods service. Such engines were never permitted to work on passenger trains.
In 1870 two 0-6-0 saddle tank designs were introduced, the one with 5ft. 0in. wheels for branch and suburban passenger duties, the other, with 4ft. 3in. wheels for shunting and local goods. The standard cylinder dimensions of these engines were 16in. x 24in., though in three of the passenger type the stroke was 22in. In these tank designs Wheatley gave up domeless boilers in favour of boilers with small domes over the firebox. These domes were topped by the safety valves, and on the tank engines had bell-mouthed casings. Eighteen passenger engines were built between 1870 and 1873 and ten of the goods type. The numbers were 39, 51, 62, 113, 136, 149, 221, 222, 226, 228, 229, 230, 255, 256, 261, 263, 405 and 406 for the passenger machines and 8, 13, 44, 66, 130, 132, 220, 223, 258 and 260 for the goods. Cowlairs turned out two ‘pug’ shunters in 1872, having 3ft. 0in. wheels and 11in. x 18in. cylinders. These engines, Nos. 18 and 311, were the only Wheatley machines to have outside cylinders. He completed his complement of shunting engines by building at Cowlairs six inside cylindered 0-6-0 saddle tanks in 1874. These had 3ft. 6in. wheels and 13in. x 18in. cylinders. They were numbered 32, 42, 144, 146, 308 and 310.
Main line passenger traffic was, until 1869, left to the existing machines. As the train service had never been outstanding for its speed or convenience, except possibly on the Edinburgh and Glasgow section where there were some notably good engines already, this was no further imposition on the travelling public; and when, in 1869, Wheatley put in hand his first express design, it was considered that two examples of the new type were quite sufficient. These locomotives, Nos. 141 and 164, were inside-framed throughout, and of the 2-4-0 type. 6ft. 6in. coupled wheels were used, together with domeless boilers and 16in. x 24in. cylinders, but shortly after they were put into service the cylinder diameter was increased to 17in.
In 1871 two further express engines were required, and here Wheatley decided to break new ground. The winding nature of certain sections of the North British main line suggested a more flexible wheelbase than that of the 2-4-0s, though from the power point of view these machines were, at the time, most suitable. He accordingly designed a 4-4-0 of somewhat similar dimensions. Inside frames were used throughout, with 17in. x 24in. cylinders and 6ft. 6in. coupled wheels. The bogie wheels were only 2ft. 9in. in diameter, and were of solid construction without spokes. In these engines, boilers with small domes over the firebox were used. They were the first examples in Britain of the 4-4-0 with inside bearings throughout and with inside cylinders, although there had been several examples of the 4-4-0 otherwise arranged. Wheatley's engines were numbered 224 and 264. No. 224 later achieved prominence by being involved in the Tay Bridge disaster of December, 1879 when it went into the river. It was, however, afterwards recovered and placed in service again and continued in traffic as No. 1192 until 1919.
In 1873 four more 4-4-0 express engines were built, but in these the earlier design was modified and improved. The diameter of the bogie wheels was increased to 3ft. 4in., though the solid type was still used. These wheels were of German manufacture, and this may have applied also to those of the earlier engines. The most important change, however, was in the provision of Wheatley’s final and improved type of boiler, which had a 1arge dome midway along the barrel. This type of boiler was used on all the later new and rebuilt machines. This series of 4-4-0 engines was numbered 420-423.
For secondary passenger services Wheatley designed a 2-4-0 type with 16in. x 24in. cylinders and 6ft. 0in. coupled wheels. These engines were also built in 1873, there being eight in all, numbered 418, 419 and 124-429. They were very satisfactory in every way, and all except Nos. 419 and 427 lasted until L.N.E.R. days, the amalgamated Company’s numbers being 10239, 10245-9 respectively. This completes the description of new engines of Wheatley’s design. He built, also, eight engines from recovered material. Six of these were 0-6-0 goods engines with 17in. x 24in. cylinders and 5ft. 0in. wheels, which owed their origin to and took their numbers from a series of inside-framed Hawthorn 0-6-0s built in 1861-2. The Wheatley engines, numbered 80-85, varied from his standard goods type in having an unequally divided wheelbase with a slightly greater distance between the leading and driving wheels than between the driving and trailing. They had the latest type of boiler, and were given new six-wheeled tenders, but the latter they did not long retain, as they were soon displaced from main line service and became shunters and station pilots.
The two other engines built from old material were 2-4-0 secondary duty passenger machines with inside frames and 16in. x 22in. cylinders. No. 40 had 5ft. 0in. coupled wheels, No. 63 4ft. l0in. coupled wheels. Both probably had a strong Hawthorn background. They seem to have been rather inconspicuous locomotives, and pottered about in the South of Scotland until the late eighties NBR outside cylindered 2-4-0 locomotive No. 1035 (ex-F&CJR) at Cowlairs. Photo: I Watson collection or early nineties. In 1871 the North British agreed to work the Forth and Clyde Junction Railway and took over from that concern four Allan-type 2-4-0 engines with 5ft. 0in. coupled wheels and 16in. x 22in. cylinders. They had been built in 1859 at the Canada Works, Birkenhead. The Canada Works had been started by the firm of Peto, Brassey & Betts in 1853, after Brassey had obtained the contract for the building of the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada. After building locomotives, rolling stock and plant for the Grand Trunk, a few Allan-type machines were built for British railways to the makers' specification, among them those in question. They had raised fireboxes with domes above, one spring-balance safety valve on the dome, and one on a column on the boiler. The Forth and Clyde engines were numbered 401-404 by the North British.
It remains to mention Wheatley’s final rebuilds, put in hand during his last two or three years of office. In all of these he used the domed boiler, and it was obviously his intention to rebuild certain complete classes rather than to perpetuate individual engines now that the necessity for improvisation had passed. The·‘90’ class of mixed-framed passenger 2-4-0, built in 1860 by Messrs. Neilson for** One of the 2-4-0 locomotives after rebuilding, including the provision of a side-window cab, as LNER No. 10249 (LNER Class E7) at Burntisland shed. Photograph: WH Whitworth, from the Hennigan collection NBR 2-4-0 locomotive No. 418 (LNER Class E7) at Haymarket shed. Included in the photograph are driver Jock Walker and blacksmith Jock Lawrie, one of the founders of St Cuthbert's Co-operative Society. Photo: Hennigan collection** the North British, were all rebuilt with Wheatley boilers, as were several of the numerous North British 15½ in. 0-6-0 goods engines, though Wheatley retired before the majority of the latter had been taken in hand. One of the Canada Works 2-4-0s was reboilered, but he had no time to deal with the remainder of the class, which were broken up by his successor in their original state, leaving No. 404 as the sole representative of the Allan conception on the North British for many years.
Of the Edinburgh and Glasgow Beyer, Peacock engines the singles 213 and 216 were reboilered by Wheatley, losing much of their beauty of line in the process. No. 216 had the driving wheels reduced to 6ft. 0in. at the same time. The 0-4-2 engines Nos. 317, 318 and 346 were also rebuilt about this time. Experimentally Wheatley reduced the coupled wheels of two of the ‘382’ class of domeless 2-4-0s from 6ft. 0in. to 5ft. 0in. and the wheels of one of the later 0-6-0s from 5ft. 0in. to 4ft. 0in. The engines concerned were Nos. 384, 388 and 201. The results obtained apparently did not justify any further conversions.
During his time cabs were introduced to the North British. Previously a weatherboard had been considered sufficient protection for the engine crew, in the later designs with a backward extension to provide a rudimentary roof. Wheatley’s cabs were, in effect, weatherboards with narrow side sheets added, the roof sloping slightly upwards towards the rear, and they did not greatly add to the comfort of the men.
In assessing Wheatley’s importance in North British locomotive history due allowance must be made. for the extremely difficult circumstances under which his term of office began. When he left the company at the end of 1874 the output. of new locomotives from Cowlairs had increased from six to forty a year, while the works also carried out the heavy repairs and all the necessary rebuilding for a stock of over four hundred and fifty engines. The reliability of the company’s locomotives had greatly NBR 2-2-2 locomotimproved, and standardisation had been carried as far as circumstances would permit. Moreover the financial position of the railway, necessarily dependent upon his success in handling the locomotive stock, had materially improved. (To be continued)
Editor’s note: the line drawings included in this article formed part of the article as published in 1943, but the photographs and captions have been added, from the Group’s Photo Archive

Alistair Nisbet. The Bishops Bridge Murder on the E & G R. 40-3.
John Green, a ganger on the construction of the Edinburgh & Glasgow at what is now known as Bishopbriggs on 10 December 1840. Three Irish labourers Doolan, Reddan and Hickie were brought to trial at the High Court in Glasgow on 23 April 1841 where Lord Moncrieff, the judge who called the accused "strangers in our country, they differ from us in religion" and a rigged jury sentenced them to be hanged at the site of the crime. Hickey was spared and sentenced to transportation. The others accompanied by cavalry and infantry with fixed bayonets were taken to the site of the crime on 14 May accompanied by Bishop Murdoch and another priest and hung in front of a large crowd..Illustration: Reid Atlantic No.9906 Teribus on express at Cadder on 6 March 1931.

John Yellowlees. The Riddings anomaly. 44-5
Borderline (Kinord Books, 2020) a thriller by Edinburgh-based author Jim Forbes has a plot that turns on the discovery that the old course of a stream places a property in Scotland and thus unexpectedly entitling the deceased’s children to claim rights in her estate. The author acknowledges that the inspiration came from the so-called ‘Riddings Anomaly’. From Kershopefoot to its confluence with the River Esk south of Riddings, the medium filum of the Liddel Water generally forms the Border between Scotland and England. However the building of the Border Union Railway from Hawick to Carlisle led to the digging in 1861 of a short section of new channel to the west of the river’s natural course. Engineers had found a number of natural obstacles in their way, including a section of the Liddel Water that ran against a cliff face which rose almost 30 metres above the waterline. The choice was between diverting the line of the railway or moving the course of the river and the latter would appear to have been the easier and cheaper option. An area of almost two acres was built up, with heavy sandstone blocks being used to move the course of the river northwards and leave an area on which the track could be laid. The result was a piece of land enclosed by the original border and the new course of the river. It seems that little mention was made of this change, perhaps to avoid the complication that would doubtless have arisen if the two countries had been alerted by the making of formal applications to the relevant authorities The practical result was that a small patch of Scotland in the vicinity of Riddings Farm became ‘stranded’ on the ‘English’ side of the river, as the Border itself continued to follow the old course of the Liddel rather than the new artificial channe.
Eight miles nearer to Carlisle the railway encountered a short crossing and re-crossing of the Border as a result of the latter’s zig-zag route at Liddel Motte was never (so far as is known) publicised by the NBR, LNER or BR. The existence of this other Border crossing seems to have been first mentioned in print by another A.J. Mullay, in Rails Across the Border. Further. the Riddings Anomaly is not the only cross-Border curiosity to be found in the neighbourhood. The Riddings Viaduct (illustrated) formerly carried the NBR Langholm branch across the Liddel Water and the structure is listed both in Scotland (grade A) and in England (grade II*)

C.J,B. Sanderson. Locomotive head lamp codes. 46-9
Reprinted from Newsletters Numbers 8 and 10 in considerably greater style and legibility. Illustration: Drummond 4-4-0T No. 73 (later No. 1402) at North Leith station, showing the two lamps (presumably both white) over the right hand buffer which formed the code for North Leith Passenger Trains. The photograph is noted as showing fireman Jock McIntosh, driver Jimmy Kay and porter Flanagan. (L.R. Tomsett)

John Roake. The Queensferry Junction Accident of 3 February [actually January] 1917. 50-3
John Balfour of the Poor Law Agency and Removal Office for Scotland, writing on 22 May 1917 to possibly a more senior inspector starts by apologizing for his long silence, explaining that the reason for the silence was mentioned in the February issue of the Poor Law Magazine. He goes on to say that he was one of the unfortunate passengers in the ill-fated express which left Edinburgh for Glasgow at 4.18p.m. on 3rd February [sic]. The smash took place at Ratho Junction at 4.35p.m. and it was 7.20p.m. before he was rescued in a semi-conscious condition from the carriage wreckage and conveyed per motor ambulance to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. He was kept in hospital for 6 or 7 weeks, during which time he was “examined 3 times under X-Rays”. After being sent home John was constantly under doctor’s care until the beginning of May.
John then goes on to tell his correspondent that “it was a terrible smash. We were travelling at 50 m.p.h. when we ran into an engine which had been allowed to get on to our line of rail. There were 14 killed outright (other sources recorded 12 deaths) and over 70 injured”. John reckoned that he had an extremely lucky escape as he was in the first carriage. The X-Ray examinations revealed that he had escaped internal injuries but he was very badly bruised and crushed in both legs from his hips right down to his ankles, with the right hand bone much bruised. He also suffered greatly from shock and sleeplessness, want of purpose, circulation etc. But at the time of writing the letter he was much better but stiff and lame. The Doctor had allowed John to work no more than 3 days per week and only on alternate days; any long business journeys were forbidden. John continues his letter by thanking the recipient for past support and that he hopes he has a continuance of said recipient’s confidence. No protection of employment in those days!
On 3 January 1917 at about 16.36 at Queensferry Junction on the Edinburgh and Glasgow main line, where the single-track branch to South Queensferry joined the main line. Ratho Station was nearby, as shown on the accompanying maps, the platforms on the South Queensferry branch being referred to as Ratho Lower. Balfour’s train was hauled by Atlantic, No. 874 Dunedin, and consisted of ten bogie coaches, nine of them electrically-lit NBR vehicles and the tenth a North Eastern railway gas-lit vehicle. The collision also involved No. 421 Jingling Geordie, a Scott class 4-4-0. It might seem surprising that quite a new 4-4-0 was working a branch passenger service on a minor line, but the day’s work for engine and crew was recorded as being to operate the 8.45 a.m. from Thornton to Glasgow Queen Street, the 11.56 a.m. from Glasgow Queen Street to Dalmeny (with the coaches perhaps being attached to an Edinburgh to Aberdeen train), the 4.19 p.m. from Dalmeny to Ratho Lower, the 5.42 p.m. from Ratho Lower to Dalmeny and then to return to Thornton light engine. The engine was run tender first from Dalmeny to Ratho Lower.
Colonel Pringle investigated for the Board of Trade and took the opportunity to look at the situation more broadly, and questioned the suitability of the layout at Queensferry Junction, the appointment of spare signalmen as traffic inspectors in districts where they had worked and the dangers involved in dealing with light engines. On this point he recommended a periodic review to identify and rectify irregular methods of working and lack of suitable protection by signals and trap points

A visit to Leith Central. 54 + rear cover
Opened in 1903; closed in 1972. Leith Central signal box: drawing in Newsletter No. 9