Charfield in the 1960s

[trafalgar45682]

Barrow Road had one local /trip turn T809 5.15 Charfield. It left St Philips with brake van at 5.25 to Westerleigh, then onto Yate, Rangeworthy and Charfield arriving at 8.30. It returned south from Charfield at 10.40 arriving back at Barrow Road at 13.00. It was nearly always a Midland 4F in 1964.

Here is a list of the engines noted on this turn in 1964. The turn finished with the closure of Westerleigh Yard in early October 1964.

Wednesday April 22 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday April 27 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Wednesday April 29 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Thursday April 30 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Friday May 1 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday May 4 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Tuesday May 5 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Wednesday May 6 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Thursday May 7 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Friday May 8 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday May 11 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Tuesday May 12 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Wednesday May 13 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Thursday May 14 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Wednesday May 20 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Thursday May 21 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Friday May 22 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Monday May 25 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Wednesday May 27 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Thursday May 28 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Friday May 29 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Tuesday June 2 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Wednesday June 3 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Thursday June 4 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Friday June 5 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday June 8 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Tuesday June 9 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Wednesday June 10 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Thursday June 11 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Friday June 12 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Monday June 15 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Tuesday June 16 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Wednesday June 17 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Thursday June 18 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Friday June 19 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Monday June 22 T809 5.15 Charfield 44135
Tuesday June 23 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Wednesday June 24 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Thursday June 25 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Friday June 26 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Saturday June 27 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday June 29 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Tuesday June 30 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Wednesday July 1 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Thursday July 2 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Friday July 3 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Monday July 6 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Tuesday July 7 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Wednesday July 8 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Thursday July 9 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Friday July 10 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday July 13 T809 5.15 Charfield 44269
Tuesday July 14 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Wednesday July 15 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Thursday July 16 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Friday July 17 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Monday July 20 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Tuesday July 21 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Wednesday July 22 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Thursday July 23 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Friday July 24 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday July 27 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Tuesday July 28 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Wednesday July 29 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Thursday July 30 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Friday July 31 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Tuesday August 4 T809 5.15 Charfield 44558
Thursday August 6 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Saturday August 8 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Monday August 24 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Tuesday August 25 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Wednesday August 26 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Friday August 28 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Monday August 31 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Tuesday Sept 1 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Wednesday Sept 2 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Thursday Sept 3 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Monday September 7 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Tuesday September 8 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Wednesday Sept 9 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Friday September 11 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Monday Sept 14 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Tuesday Sept 15 T809 5.15 Charfield 44264
Friday September 18 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Monday Sept 21 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Tuesday Sept 22 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Wednesday Sept 23 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Thursday Sept 24 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Friday Sept 25 T809 5.15 Charfield 44466
Monday Septr 28 T809 5.15 Charfield 44135
Wednesday Septr 30 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924
Thursday October 1 T809 5.15 Charfield 44534
Friday October 2 T809 5.15 Charfield 43924

Appropriately, the last time it ran, preserved 43924 was the engine.

[Robin Summerhill]

As a lad of 14 I was too immature to appreciate the operational politics and nuances of the day.

By calculation I am a few months younger than you, so details such as this escaped me at the time as well! It is only through years of watching people waste money and resources in many different organisations that this sort of thing jumps out at me these days!

Off topic I know, but if people who were as old and experienced in those days, as we are now, should have spotted wastes of money like this and done something about them. If they had, there may have been no need for Beeching and the retrenchments of the 1960s.

And by this I mean middle and senior management, not the blokes on the coal face who could probably see it anyway. But if my experience of BR middle and senior management from the 1970s was anything to go by, many of them seemed to think they were army officers and looked for no more than unquestioning obedience from their subordinates.

But another on-topic issue regarding the dieselisation of the 0915. Patrick says they were in the habit of sending a Castle LE to Gloucester to pick up the return working. 7P motive power sent to do little more than haul itself and three virtually empty coaches back to Bristol?! Clearly Barrow Road were not thinking about, or couldn't care less about, the fuel bill for an engine of that size on such a menial task. Sending a 4F would have been a lot cheaper

PS - I am not Phillip Shirley and you cannot claim your five pounds

[buxton4472]

Barrow Road had one local /trip turn T809 5.15 Charfield. It left St Philips with brake van at 5.25 to Westerleigh, then onto Yate, Rangeworthy and Charfield arriving at 8.30. It returned south from Charfield at 10.40 arriving back at Barrow Road at 13.00. It was nearly always a Midland 4F in 1964.

Here is a list of the engines noted on this turn in 1964. The turn finished with the closure of Westerleigh Yard in early October 1964.

I have a photo of one of a 4F on this working about to leave the station at Charfield in Spring 1964...

http://s279723315.websitehome.co.uk/rai ... arf_12.JPG

There is one thing I should like to clear up. The 'pickup' goods continued (after the closure of the station to passengers) on a three-times-a-week basis. Where did the trip go to once Westerleigh yard was closed? Was it Stoke G or one of the other ex-GW Bristol depots? I remember Hymeks and NBL Type 2's were common on this train once dieselised.

[buxton4472]

Patrick says they were in the habit of sending a Castle LE to Gloucester to pick up the return working. 7P motive power sent to do little more than haul itself and three virtually empty coaches back to Bristol?! Clearly Barrow Road were not thinking about, or couldn't care less about, the fuel bill for an engine of that size on such a menial task. Sending a 4F would have been a lot cheaper)

...and of course 4F's were common on these trains, but yes, a 7P on three coaches was extravagant! But not as extravagant as a 9F seen on a couple of occasions (one of these running tender-first on an up stopper so I suppose we could assume it was commandeered to stand in for a failed 'coffee-pot').

While on the subject of 'light-weights' I remember (just!) back in the 50's seeing a two coach train always hauled by an ex-MR 2P 4-4-0 racing through Charfield on the down line around mid-afternoon in summer. My grandfather (who was signalman there until 1953) told me it was the 'Bath portion' (of what I do not know). Can anyone ascertain from memory or WTT's of that period if this was correct? Or have I been having seriously real/(sad?) dreams? The Pines Express, of course, was a much heavier train!

[jules]

It is only through years of watching people waste money and resources in many different organisations that this sort of thing jumps out at me these days!

Clearly Barrow Road were not thinking about, or couldn't care less about, the fuel bill for an engine of that size on such a menial task. Sending a 4F would have been a lot cheaper

There was probably a bit of human nature behind such decisions/practices too. When all the staff knew Barrow Road would be closing and the Midland lines ripped up, I doubt if they cared at all about cost and efficiency anymore ...

Reminds me of the final batch of Courage Best to come out of the Bristol Brewery before closure. The whole lot was very rapidly recalled, as the brewers added their own rather personal additional ingredient to it! (Before they all marched off to the Jobless Centre).

[oldchapie]

we had a superintendent who was an x naval officer and he was in charge of engine-men that's how good it was in the 1970"s.he thought that we were his ratings.

[Robin Summerhill]

if my experience of BR middle and senior management from the 1970s was anything to go by, many of them seemed to think they were army officers and looked for no more than unquestioning obedience from their subordinates.

we had a superintendent who was an x naval officer and he was in charge of engine-men that's how good it was in the 1970"s.he thought that we were his ratings.

I suspect we might have the same bloke in mind at Bath Road

[oldchapie]

oh dear was there two of them in bristol ?

[buxton4472]

I am in the process of constructing some web pages in which I am detailing my recollections of the years immediately before and after the closure of Charfield (and the other ex-Midland line) stations in the mid 1960s.

Slowly but surely I'll get there! I have just finished transcribing my spotting notes from 1963/1964 and converting them to HTML format so if you are interested you will find them at

http://s279723315.websitehome.co.uk/rai ... og1963.php

and

http://s279723315.websitehome.co.uk/rai ... og1964.php

One thing I had almost forgotten was the quite frequent scheduling of up to fifteen extra southbound freights on Sundays, presumably to clear backlogs of coal sitting up in the Midlands awaiting its fate at the gasworks of Bristol, Bath, Exeter etc.. They used to kick off from Washwood Heath and Woodford Halse around midnight, thereafter at 30 - 60 minute intervals to STJ, Stoke Gifford and Westerleigh. They were generally class '8' unfitted freights so took their time to get as far south as Gloucestershire. The locos often returned north the same afternoon light engine or as two to four coupled together. When these ran on Sundays when the Severn Tunnel diversions were using the Midland route, Sundays were often busier than a weekday - and then any single line working anywhere between Standish and Yate could create chaos!

[Pines Alan]

Ref the ô2Pö and two coaches:
This train may have been the return working of a remnant of the 11.40am from Bournemouth to the North. Robin Atthill in his S&D book refers to it as only going to Gloucester some time after the war, but in summer occasionally to Derby (the 1959 WTT shows that as Fri only dated). By this time the normal destination was Bristol.
The return leg was something like a 3.30pm from Gloucester; a 1936 photo in LMS Journal No. 30 shows 2P No. 528 on a two coach train near Standish Jn, believed to be this working. The caption, in part, states that it is conveying the through coach from Bradford to Bournemouth which was detached from the Devonian at Derby, thence to Gloucester on the 10.20 York to Bristol as far as Gloucester.
I cannot locate a W N Lockett photo in one of his books but I am sure there is one showing a ôGloucester to Bournemouth trainö.
Mr AtthillÆs S&D book goes on to refer to the back working as a 4.25pm from Bath to Bournemouth. I think that by the mid fifties this had become the 3.35 Bristol TM to Bournemouth. Sorry itÆs not a complete answer and apologies for delayed response

[buxton4472]

Thanks, Alan, for your response. If the bit about 'some time after the war' extends to say 1956 then this could well be the answer. If only I had some pre-1960 WTTs to consult!

[Pines Alan]

The W N Lockett book I was trying to find last week is "The Norman Lockett Archive - The Somerset & Dorset Railway 1935 - 1966" by Mike Arlett and David Lockett. There are a few photos and references to the Gloucester to Bournemouth train and one caption indicates that the "3.35 pm Bristol to Bournemouth was the service which in earlier years had commenced at Gloucester in the Summer months, a practice which ceased at the end of the 1956 season."
Regards

[buxton4472]

...the "3.35 pm Bristol to Bournemouth was the service which in earlier years had commenced at Gloucester in the Summer months, a practice which ceased at the end of the 1956 season."
Regards

Well, that clinches it, then! My grandfather (who called it the 'Bath Portion' !) moved from Charfield to Cheshire in 1957 so summer 1956 must have been when I would have seen the Johnson 2P bowling along with two LMS coaches in tow. I was six at the time but his comment has stuck with me since - amazing thing, memory.
Many thanks, Alan, for confirming this for me.