Riding Yorkshire's Final Steam Trains

by Keith Widdowson

  I was to reenact a similar scenario two weeks later, on this occasion, however, arriving into Leeds on the 17 47 Manchester Exchange/York working. Crossing over to Bradford for the 20 45 Fridays-only dated Paignton train ex-Mirfield 45208 took us back over to Leeds. Staying aboard we alighted at Wakefield for the portion, which two weeks previously was the focus of the confrontational scene upon arrival into Bradford and the locomotive that was to perform the ‘last rites’ the following month – Fairburn 42152. Luckily the scene wasn’t repeated and we once more caught the 23 55 departure – unbelievably 45208 having run light engine back from Leeds to work.

  Once more repeating the cycle of trains caught two weeks previously, we went south to Doncaster and north-west to Wakefield for yet more twilight hours spent festering there for the westbound Calder Valley mails. The reader might wonder about the mentality of such moves in the middle of the night, when barring shift workers, most normal persons were tucked up in a warm bed. As a vindication I can only state that it was all disappearing and it had to be done. I can look back into my notebooks and records with gratifying satisfaction in that nothing like the scenario viewed and participated in back then can be replicated nowadays – the sleep deprivation, cold and festering for many hours not, as yet, appearing to have had any detrimental effect on my longevity! Although this brief encounter didn’t reap any new catches at least the trains that should have been steam were.

  13

  NO MORE WAKEFIELD PORTIONS

  ALTHOUGH THE NORTH Eastern Region had been amalgamated within the Eastern Region of British Rail since 1 January 1967, the HQ being located at York with the redoubtable G.F. Fiennes as the General Manager, BR continued to publish a separate 228-page public timetable – as before contained within its distinctive tangerine-coloured covers. Although denoting validity from 6 March until 3 September, on delving inside it showed Leeds Central having been expurgated from it – a note on the relevant pages (tables 19 and 21) reading ‘Important. The services printed above operate from 1 May 1967. For services 6 March to 30 April see separate supplement’ – the tables concerned underscoring the fact that Bradford Forster Square had lost all of its ‘portioned’ trains to and from Leeds City.

  Leeds Central railway station, opened in 1854 as a joint venture between four different railway companies (LNWR/L&Y/GNR/NER), was amputated from the railway network after the last train had departed on Saturday 29 April 1967. Once the departure point of named expresses such as The West Riding Pullman, The White Rose and The Queen of Scots Pullman the 1-in-100 incline immediately outside the station, necessary to clear the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, was often the scene for spectacular starts – the locomotives slipping on wet/greasy rails with their heavy trains. The cramped seven-platformed (and two-bayed) above-street-level station of Leeds Central was, after nationalisation, always going to be a candidate for consolidation. It was an easy solution, albeit eight years from planning to implementation, with slewed pointwork at Whitehall Junction, a mere half mile outside the station, offering a new link enabling Doncaster and Kings Cross traffic to access Leeds City station. The site was cleared and acquired by the Post Office and all that remains to remind residents there today is the blue plaqued remnants of the erstwhile wagon hoist (used to raise/lower wagons between the low (road level) and high (rail level) goods yard) and, over the nearby canal, remains of the disused viaduct itself.

  The disastrous side effect, from a steam chaser’s view, of the closure was the cessation of the Wakefield Westgate/Bradford Exchange portions that had been routed via Wortley West Curve. This short connecting spur was subsequently lifted in 1985 notwithstanding vociferous concerns from Bradford residents fearing the presage, subsequently proving unfounded, of the end of through services to London. The portions, which were detached from the Kings Cross/Leeds Central services, had with few exceptions remained steam operated – the authorities never attempting to diagram diesels aware of their short-term future. Although Bradford Exchange bound passengers from London and the south could still travel on through services (albeit much reduced in numbers) by enduring a reversal at Leeds City these services predictably ceased in the early ’70s. The other Bradford station at Forster Square became relegated to secondary status with only departures for Ilkley and Skipton – all previously portioned services for Leeds and the south ceasing forthwith. Taking all the above into consideration I made a concerted effort to travel on the doomed portions on all four Saturdays of that April leading up to the closure.

  On the first of those April Saturdays, with Engelbert Humperdinck’s Release Me topping the charts, as always the aperitif of the Calder Valley mail trains was imbibed upon arrival in the area. As with all visits accessing this mail train scenario, I had to depart from St Pancras the previous evening, changing at Sheffield, onto the now dieselised 02 00 departure, and Normanton. I sometimes, for the sheer hell of it, started out from London on an earlier than necessary train, changing at Kettering and Nottingham, purely (wait for it) to catch runs with several of the Peak diesel locomotives. No I wasn’t changing into modern traction chasing, I had always noted every EL and DL that I travelled behind anyway – they were, after all, still numbers in Ian Allan’s Combined Volume that could be redlined!

  Returning to that first visit of ’67, at Normanton one of Wakefield’s two remaining Black 5s, 44990, took us the 22 miles from Normanton to Halifax on the 02 10 York/Manchester, handing over to Newton Heath’s 45271. As always alighting at Hebden Bridge, a station awarded the accolade of the annual best kept station in 1965 by the NER management, at 05 05 after a mere twenty-three-minute wait the arrival of the 04 20 Manchester/York train produced on that particular morning Holbeck’s 45075 – indeed on the few remaining occasions that summer I caught the eastbound train it was always a 55A locomotive. Not staying on the train beyond Normanton, perhaps it was either a DL on a non-required steam, we travelled over to Manchester, fingers crossed, for what had been seen in the LMR Special Traffic Notices as a possible steam-worked ‘footex’ (a train chartered for football supporters). Always monitoring the relevant region’s STNs for any variations/reliefs/extras that offered possible steam haulage, we had spotted a 1X17 11 31 footex between Manchester and Leeds that day. Who was playing whom we didn’t care, the subsequently preserved but then Patricroft-allocated Standard 5MT 73096 (noisily banked the 1¾ miles to Miles Platting by 44697) being turned out for the 43-mile journey over the Pennines. She wasn’t in the best of health and having struggled with the eleven-coach train stopped for a two-minute ‘blow up’ at Diggle Junction – after which a 52½mph was maxed through Golcar.

  While all the fans went to the match we filled in the five-hour turnaround with far more beneficial things than kicking a lump of air-filled spherical polyhedron around – we went portion bashing! We made our way to the recently opened station at New Pudsey – a relatively rare event in those days of the retrenchment-minded BR. The station’s accompanying publicity flyer avowed ‘incorporating sufficient car parking space to enable motorists from large residential areas north of Leeds and Bradford to use main line train services without having to negotiate congested city streets’. This additional station stop enabled greater flexibility for us enthusiasts with the ability to change on/off the portions – no intermediate stops being made prior to then. From there we caught Fairburn 2-6-4T 42235 the 3½ miles into Bradford Exchange.

  In those pre-Internet/fast communication days the only method of keeping up to date with locomotive transfers and withdrawals was via magazines such as The Railway World, and even that, bearing in mind it was a monthly publication, reflected changes occurring retrospectively. Why am I highlighting this? Well we all had 42235 down as a Springs Branch (Wigan) locomotive! As if the day couldn’t get any more special (an allusion to Frank & Nancy Sinatra’s Somethin’ Stupid riding high in the charts at the time), a mere forty-five minutes after arriving into Bradford the 15 05 departure had sister Fairburn 42287, transferred in from Trafford Park three months previo
usly, taking us the 17 miles to Wakefield Westgate. I’d had six required haulages so far – could the luck continue? The answer, in the form of a lost-looking Lostock Hall-allocated 45226, was yes – she being turned out by Wakefield for the 16 28 portion into Bradford Exchange. Time was running out for the returning 18 15 footex departure from Leeds and so, having undertaken the short walk across to Bradford’s Forster Square, a run with Manningham’s Fairburn 42085 on the three-coach 17 27 Sheffield departure took us the 13½ miles via Shipley to Leeds City.

  Although the returning footex departed only a few minutes late it was immediately obvious the fans were drowning their sorrows with wanton abandonment (it was a 6th Round FA Cup match – Leeds United 1 Manchester City 0). Despite having police presence on board, with their dogs, the communication cord was pulled on several occasions with fire extinguishers either being set off or thrown out of the window. We enthusiasts contained ourselves in several compartments – feet wedged firmly against the corridor doors to foil any attempted incursion by the marauding mob. We were more concerned about whether or not the connection with the 20 55 Belfast Boat Express departure was going to be made. We arrived into the Exchange station sixty-eight minutes late, at 20 50, giving us just five minutes to run the length of Europe’s longest railway platform to the adjacent Victoria station – just making it with the welcoming sight of Carnforth’s 45134 (my ninth requirement of the day!) impatient to get going.

  This visit ‘oop north’ was top and tailed with SR steam outings on the Friday and Sunday and I was well and truly knackered upon arrival back home, having been out over sixty hours – but hey ho, with a steam mileage of 905 it made it all worthwhile. After reading one of my articles in the railway press a few years ago a long-term friend said, ‘Your youth appears to have been spent in perpetual motion.’ Having just reread this paragraph I am inclined to agree. Would I be as lucky the following week?

  The short answer to that was no! With Britain celebrating Sandie Shaw’s Puppet on a String win at the Eurovision Song Contest (no ex-Iron Curtain country block voting then!), Saturday 15 April saw some of us congregating at Carlisle at the unearthly hour of 01 30 tempted by the showing in the LMR STN of a 1X12 22 20 footex from Glasgow to Euston. Having previously ascertained it was to be Brit-worked, via Ais Gill to boot, our hopes, never taken for granted, were vindicated as Brit 70033 Charles Dickens came down from Kingmoor in readiness. Unfortunately an almost similar replication of last week’s delays was to befall us, i.e. drunken ‘fans’, police and their dogs, not helped by a preceding parcels train catching fire at Blackburn – all contributing to an eventual 155-minute late arrival into Crewe. Upon arrival there, at 07 53, we were signalled into the non-platformed middle road. Not a problem for us enthusiasts and using our BR1 carriage key (all doors had been locked en route) we scrambled out, crossed a running line and clambered onto the platform. We had been spotted, not by the police but by the train’s occupants and we quickly scarpered from the scene – glancing back to see a line of marauding fans following us out of the unlocked door!

  Although all the above is not particularly relevant to this book I have included reference to the journey as a way of explaining my late arrival that Saturday into the NER. After that debacle I left Crewe, changing at Stockport, travelling over the line currently served by one parliamentarian train per week but back then offering prospective customers one per hour, for Stalybridge. Onwards over the Pennines and by changing once again, this time at Mirfield, an eventual arrival time of 10 44 was made into Wakefield Kirkgate.

  Walking to the Westgate station I waited, and waited and waited – for something required to materialise. Services had first commenced running from this station precisely 100 years previously and was, at the time of my visit, undergoing a much needed renovation – the areas away from the platforms resembling something akin to a building site. Over the years Wakefield’s Westgate station has seen a substantial increase in patronage, primarily resulting from the increased frequency of services consequential from the electrification of the line in 1989. So much so that a re-sited station, as part of the Westgate Key Development Area, was formally opened in February 2014 by the Secretary of State Patrick McLoughlin MP – the former ‘no longer fit for purpose’. After a three-hour wait the solitary run I had on that April ’67 day in the area was with Low Moor-allocated Fairburn 42055 on the 13 42 portion to Bradford. This Fairburn, having spent the first thirteen years of her life working suburban services out of Glasgow Central, was, to put it bluntly, becoming painfully common. After last week’s highs this was a definite low.

  The success or failure, in a chaser’s eyes, was always dictated by the number of required catches and, without any other possibilities circulating that day, I cut my losses, returning to Carlisle for another Brit – on the soon to be dieselised last surviving booked steam crossing over the border: the 20 32 Carlisle to Perth. The weekend, however, was far from finished. Upon returning to Euston on the Sunday morning I boarded The Mercian rail tour (detailed in Chapter 11), which, courtesy of preserved locomotives 3442 The Great Marquess and 4472 Flying Scotsman, took me on a circular trip from Euston via Bolton, Keighley and Leeds Central to Kings Cross.

  So to the third Saturday – 22 April. Had I exhausted all that was available? Expecting the worst, the ritual of the Calder Valley mail services was once more partaken of, reaping a surprising catch of Stockport’s 44836 on the Low Moor’s Normanton departure at 03 10 (locomotives allocated to depots with no booked passenger duties were eagerly welcomed because of their rarity value).

  Taken over at Halifax with the extremely common Newton Heath 44891, I was less than delighted with Holbeck’s 45211, a locomotive caught working a Nottingham/Marylebone train ten months previous, turning up at Hebden Bridge on the eastbound Manchester/York. With no passenger work allocated to the class anywhere in Britain I was more than made up upon arrival into Normanton, where the Manchester locomotive was taken off and the foreman sent out his home depot’s LMS Mogul 43043.

  Not always bothering (other than on the Southern) to take accurate passing times/speeds with my ever-present stopwatch, it seems, judging from my tattered notebook, this day was an exception – with all trains caught that day onwards being recorded thus. With her 3c/1v load, the ‘Flying Pig’ was easily able to maintain time through the low-lying farmland – a max of 60mph passing Burton Salmon leading to a two-minute early arrival into York.

  Travelling over to Leeds I reaped a run with a Type 2 ‘Splutterbug’ (D5237) on a Forster Square portion before crossing to the Exchange for another run with Low Moor’s Fairburn 42116 on the 11 00 portion for Leeds Central – maxing at, with her 4c load, 50mph passing through Bramley. Heading south to Wakefield for the 13 42 Bradford portion (third week in a row on this train!) what should follow me there but 42116. This time, however, she was a little livelier (perhaps with only a 3c load) attaining 58mph north of Beeston Junction before slamming the brakes on for the speed-restricted Wortley Curves.

  Ex-Trafford Park, now Wakefield-allocated 42574, one of only a handful of Stanier 2-6-4Ts remaining, returned me to Wakefield, twice obtaining 62mph during the thirty-six-minute, 17-mile three-vehicle train. Last year, having spent the day chasing in the area, there was always the one-coach 22 00 Bradford/Huddersfield to return home on (via Wigan!), but, since it was now missing from the timetable (public anyway), I was inclined to call it a day at 16 00 – unless otherwise persuaded. Suitable persuasion, in the form of a required Holbeck 44826, turned up from Wakefield shed for the 16 28 Bradford portion. After 44826 deposited me at Bradford Exchange I had already decided to catch the 17 20 all the way to Kings Cross. I couldn’t have been more pleased, a grin from ear to ear perhaps surprising some normal customers, on sighting the motive power for it. Ex-Springs Branch (Wigan), now Low Moor, Fairburn 42233 (subsequently withdrawn five days later) worked the 9½ miles to Leeds Central, driver Johnson maxing at 53mph through Bramley – Deltic D9012 Crepello taking me forward to Kings Cross at 2
1 02 that night. A rare Saturday night in my own bed!

  Extracts from notebook.

  Extracts from notebook.

  During those far-off dying days of the Iron Horse you couldn’t be everywhere at the same time. Train services were being dieselised, lines were closing and the last remaining examples of many classes of steam locomotive were sometimes specifically steamed up for final occasions. The final weekend of Leeds Central was another example – it clashing with the withdrawal of Scotland’s steam allocation (in reality many more incursions were made into Scotland throughout the summer of ’67 – but were with English-allocated power). How did we solve this one? The answer lay in taking a valuable annual leave day on Friday 28 April – not particularly perturbed by that day’s news that the UK applied for EEC membership. By doing this Jock (it had to be him didn’t it!) and I caught the few remaining suburban steam services out of Glasgow on the Friday morning, bashing Motherwell, Corkerhill and Polmadie sheds during the day, before heading south to Carlisle for the Brit-worked 20 32 Perth departure.

  Backtracking to Carlisle we tried to get some shut-eye while travelling over Ais Gill in the early hours of Saturday 29 April en route to Leeds. Arriving into the City station at just gone 3 a.m. the short walk between there and the Central station held no fears – even though all previous occasions had been during daylight hours. Indeed I had often crossed between termini within major cities, e.g. Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield and London, in the dead of night. In the case of London, although if you had the patience to wait there were eventually buses or tubes, arriving on Sunday mornings into either Marylebone at 05 06 (22 50 ex-Manchester) or Euston at 02 40 (20 46 ex-Barrow) I usually walked across London. Perhaps it was the naivety of youth that saw me avoid any ‘problems’ such as one could encounter today. Unlike today’s twenty-four-hour binge-drinking climate with its associated antisocial disorder, back then, with the licensed outlets having all closed by midnight, the streets, the odd vagrant excepted, were deserted. Occasional approaches by ladies of the night enquiring if I wanted ‘to spend a little time with them’ being responded to by pleading poverty.