The Bristol Railway Archive

There was a trailing single slip on the up line but this move could potentially block both lines for a while, maybe this is the reason?

tonyperks wrote:There was a trailing single slip on the up line but this move could potentially block both lines for a while, maybe this is the reason?

That's a good enough reason, Tony - in addition to which there would only be sufficient traffic for the one wagon drop/pick-up per day so why not make it a down trip from Westerleigh that does the biz?

Incidentally, I received my second-hand copy of 'An Historical Survey of the Midland in Gloucestershire' that you put me on to, and it is very interesting. It mentions TWO signal-boxes at Charfield on the up side prior to 1911. Whether or not they existed simultaneously is not clear. One for definite was just about in line with the present-day relay room and opposite the wagon turntable (you can see the space where it used to be in the foreground of the full-page 1932 photo), but there is no mention of where the other might have been. The obvious place would have been at the trailing connection into the up line from the up refuge siding a bit south of where the current up loop signal is - too far to be worked from the station box, but that's just me guessing. By 1928 the points there were certainly being worked from a ground frame. I don't think the author was referring to Bendall's Siding (Huntingford Mill) as the signal-box there was actually called by that name and warranted its own entry and discussion in the text. I am planning a visit to the Midland Study Centre in Derby in the next few weeks so possibly some evidence may come to light there.

So far, I have found two 'errors' to photo captions (which I apologise for mentioning if they have already been discussed in another thread on this site). One is for a train at Yate South hauled by a 'County' class. It states that it is a 'Bristol train' which (in my mind at least suggests that would be its destination) but the photo is actually of an up train as it is crossing the 'flyover' over the Midland line. Almost certainly this would be a West Country - Wolverhampton LL Summer Saturday express.
The other possible error is the caption to ex-MR 4-4-0 40528 on a down local passenger train. I think that the train shown (only two coaches) is the summer season Gloucester - Bath/Bournemouth (which my grandfather used to refer to as the 'Bath portion'). This is because the loco is carrying 'A' class lamps and not 'B' as the local trains would have done, and it is only a two coach formation rather than the usual three used on the Gloucester - Bristol stoppers. As I have mentioned in a different thread on this site, I can just remember seeing this train from the top of the playing field as a lad of six speeding through Charfield (the train not me!) on a warm summer afternoon at about 3:45 pm with that same combination of ex-MR 4-4-0 2P and two ex-LMS coaches.

The author mentions conversion of Charfield's refuge lay-bys to loops in 1942. The north end points of both were worked electrically ('short' levers 2 and 8 in the signal-box). What I should be interested to find out is whether the intermediate block colour-light signals at Wick (3 miles N of Charfield) were commissioned at about the same time. These were worked from Charfield box by a substantial chromed-steel slide with sprung trigger release housed in a dark brown box mounted on the block instrument shelf - one for the down pair (home and distant) and one for the up pair. They both had brass plates on the box fronts bearing the maker's name - Westinghouse. Both up and down lines were fully track-circuited through the intermediate block section and continuing south through the station at Charfield. I remember as a spotter on the platform beneath the signal-box windows it was quite easy to gauge the speed and length of an approaching down train by the period of time between successive annunciator noises as the train occupied and cleared adjacent track circuits before and after the down IBS home. It seemed interminable for a class 'J' mineral train with a 'Coffee-pot' at its head (possibly 43924)!

Sorry about the length of this posting - I got a bit carried away but someone, somewhere might find it interesting.

Keep it coming I love hearing about "our "station have you any photos of the inside of the box at charfield?

tonyperks wrote:Have you any photos of the inside of the box at charfield?

No, Tony, unfortunately I haven't. However, somewhere back in my parents' house in the village I have got some old reel-to-reel recordings made at Charfield station in the mid-60s and amongst those was a recording made in the signal-box with block bells dinging and levers being thrown, against the background of an 8F pulling away from the down loop with a coal train. Whether the recordings have survived the nearly 50 years since they were made would remain to be seen (or rather heard). Despite no photos, I can remember the general layout of the box plus lever designations, block instruments, illuminated track diagram, etc so in the next couple of weeks I'll draw it all out as best I can and put it on-line as a web-page if you would be interested. One thing I salvaged just after the station closed was a train register spanning mid-Nov 1964 - mid-Jan 1965 which includes the day the station closed to passenger trains (2/1/65). I have extracted a couple of sample days-worth of entries and will make them available as web-pages. too. I've diverged completely off-topic by now so if I discuss Charfield again it will be as a new thread!