|
In which I continue work as a Management
Trainee on British Railways, attend a course at Derby and spend some time ar Reading Loco driving locomotives.
Wednesday 1 July 1744 Henley to Twyford, Single power car. Wednesday 22 July I finished my "Bus Stop" job on 2 July and went up to Worksop that evening. I spent the weekend there - we went to Sheffield on the Saturday - and went to the school at Derby on Monday 6 July. We had the two week Commercial Briefing Course. It was quite good - more interesting than I thought it would be. We had a visit to Boots factory at Beeston which was quite interesting. Everybody came away with a tube of toothpaste, a cake of soap and a bubble bath. I spent the following two weekends at Worksop, travelling in all cases over the Nottingham - Mansfield - Worksop line - very interesting, especially the two Sentinel steam locomotives at Whitwell Colliery. The most interesting part of our stay at Derby was undoubtedly two visits we made to the Cromford and High Peak line on the evenings of 14 and 15 July (Tues and Wed). The first night was by car in rain and cloud while on Wednesday we went by rail to Cromford station and walked to the High peak Goods Station from there. The rails were rusty yet had evidently been used within the last few weeks. The connection with the Derby - Manchester (ex-Midland Railway) main line is at High Peak Junction which has two sidings, quickly going to single through well-wooded country. It crosses the river and canal to run close to the latter to Cromford Goods (¾ -1 mile) . The single line shed was closed in April 1964 and the track had been lifted. A fixed manual crane was on the canal wharf. There was a Midland Railway 4-wheel crane and match truck in the siding by the canal. 
   Brian Ward at the bottom of Cromford Incline Our last stop was at the top of the Hopton Incline (1 in 14) which is the steepest adhesion-worked incline in the country. It was rope worked until locomotives superseded horse power. It was almost dark when we reached our last call, It had been raining and the clouds were pretty heavy. It was very erie walking up the 1 in 14 incline. We could imagine North London Railway tank engines storming up with a handful of wagons. Monday 20 July I came back to Reading Loco on Monday morning by the Master Cutler Pullman. It was pretty good but I don't think it was really worth the 5/6d supplement. I have had a pretty good week as far as railways go. On Monday I went to Basingstoke and drove both ways. I drove Grange class 4-6-0 6831 to Basingstoke light. On the way back the train was cancelled so we brought 2-8-0 No. 48325 back light. It was quite exciting although not very much to it. We had some signals and a 20 mph pw check going over and signals on the way back. I was taught to look back at a distant I had passed. It was on when we passed it but cleared before we reached the home signal. This is one advantage of semaphore signals compared to colour lights. The 2-8-0 had a very stiff regulator which I could only move using both hands. She had quite a loud knock on the right hand side. I did a bit of moving locomotives around the shed including a 61xx 2-6-2, a Hall 4-6-0 and an ex-SR 2-6-0 No. 31842. the 2-6-0 was great fun as it was low in steam and I had to shunt some wagons. I had to use full regulator and even so she seemed very tired. Thursday 23 July  Manor 4-6-0 No. 7808 Cookham Manor, rounds the curve into Redhill with the Saturday 1035 Birmingham Snow Hill - Hastings train on June 22 1962. Sunday 26 July D1000 2128 Paddington to Reading a. 2200. To relief line through Acton and Ealing Thursday 30 July D1693 1551 Reading (from Weston super Mare) |
