Beyer Peacock Locomotives for the Great Central Railway - A brief summary by Dennis Wilcock

Transcription

1 Beyer Peacock Locomotives for the Great Central Railway - A brief summary by Dennis Wilcock No.215 built in 1865 was one of a batch of four locomotives originally intended for the Sardinian Railways. They were the first locomotives Beyer Peacock supplied to the MS&LR. Note the brass makers nameplate on the forward driving wheel splasher. ANDREW DOW COLLECTION In Main Line No.161 I looked at Beyer Peacock, the company. In this issue, I will look at the locomotives that company built for the GCR and its antecedents. Before embarking on an examination of the locomotives, it is worth looking at how the railway company, as we recognise it, came to exist. The origins of the Great Central Railway (GCR) can be traced back through the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (MS&LR) to the Sheffield, Ashton-under-Lyne and Manchester Railway (SA&MR - incorporated on 5 th May, 1837) and prior schemes some of which failed to come to fruition. However, it was the amalgamation of the SA&MR with the Great Grimsby and Sheffield Junction Railway (GG&SJR - incorporated on 30 th June, 1845), the Grimsby Docks Company (incorporated on 8 th August, 1845) and the Sheffield and Lincolnshire Junction Railway (S&LJR - incorporated on 3 rd August, 1846) which enabled the combined company to adopt the name of the MS&LR (incorporated on 27 th July, 1846) coming into general use on 1 st January, The new company was thus able to link the manufacturing powerhouse and port of Manchester with Grimsby (and ultimately Immingham in 1912), New Holland and the North Sea. In doing so they were able to transport goods and passengers from the Atlantic to the North Sea and onwards to Continental Europe and vice versa. The products of the Manchester cotton mills and the coal from the Yorkshire coalfields thus gained access to these markets. Were the pioneers men of enterprise and vision? In 2014 a high speed route linking Liverpool with Hull, HS3, was proposed. Did someone say MS&LR? The elegant Class 23 designed by Charles Sacré. No.246 of 1867 rests on the turntable at Hayfield. This outside framed design was the most numerous of the goods locomotives designed by Sacré. ANDREW DOW COLLECTION

2 It was on 1 st August, 1897, as the London Extension was being built, that the company adopted the more fitting title of Great Central Railway, reflecting its new status as a trunk route into London. Throughout this time and up to the Grouping in 1923, the company had to equip itself with the locomotives to operate its ever-expanding services. In stark contrast to today s fragmented railway system, the railway companies, right up to the demise of British Rail in 1991, had a totally different philosophy. They sought to own every aspect of their business right from the land on which the railway ran, the track and infrastructure and the carriages, wagons and locomotives. They further wished to own the track and infrastructure maintenance facilities and the means of manufacturing, repairing and maintaining their own carriages, wagons and locomotives. The GCR and others went further by acquiring a fleet of steamers that plied up and down the English coast and across to Europe. As a result, they had the control of traffic well beyond the bounds of the railway and thus benefited from the increased revenue that it brought. The railway companies ambitions were not limited to land and sea. In the 1930s the Great Western Railway established air services. In March, 1934, the GWR combined with the LNER, LMS, SR and Imperial Airways to form Railway Air Services (RAS). In 1946, the government fearing that the railway companies were becoming transport conglomerates with monopolistic powers, formed the state owned British European Airways Corporation (BEA) and the services of RAS were absorbed into that company. Concentrating now on the locomotives, independent builders were involved in two periods of construction - that before and that after the railway companies had established their own manufacturing facilities. In the case of the MS&LR Gorton Works, the Gorton Tank, had Beyer Peacock works photographs. Top: An un-numbered Class of 1865 originally intended for Sardinian Railways. Left: Class No.247 of July, 1867 in Works Grey without its tender. BOTH: MUSEUM OF SCIENCE & INDUSTRY/ SCIENCE & SOCIETY PICTURE LIBRARY

3 Left: GCR Class 9F (LNER N5) 0-6-2T No.542 of February, 1894 stands outside Gartsides (Brookside Brewery) Ltd at Gorton c1920. Below: Classmates No.532 (December, 1893) and 519 (September, 1893) outside Manchester London Road c1920. The two locomotives were part of a batch of 66 built over the period 1893/94. BOTH: P F COOKE/RAIL ARCHIVE STEPHENSON been established in 1848 by Richard Peacock but was fully engaged in the repair and maintenance of locomotives, carriages and wagons. It was not until 1858 that Gorton manufactured its first locomotives - two Class s to be followed in 1859 by a further two members of the class. So for the period from 1841, when the first locomotive, a 0-4-2, was built by Kirtley for the SA&MR, to 1858, locomotive building was in the hands of the independent builders. During that period a total of 125 locomotives were built for the SA&MR, GG&SJR and MS&LR. Table 1 shows the locomotive builders for the MS&LR/GCR. Up to 1858 it reads like a veritable Who s Who of early locomotive builders. In order of first locomotive built the companies were as follows: Kirtley - Robert Stephenson Sharp Roberts Sharp Bros the company formed when the partnership at Sharp Roberts was dissolved and where Charles Frederick Beyer became Chief Engineer Fenton Craven where Richard Peacock served an apprenticeship Fossick & Hackworth - W J & J Garforth - Tulk & Ley Rayne & Burn - E B Wilson R & W Hawthorn - William Fairburn & Sons Sharp Stewart the company that emanated from Sharp Bros when John Sharp retired in 1852 and Charles Patrick Stewart took over and the year that Beyer left the company George England Many of the names will be familiar but some less so. Fenton Craven & Co is perhaps one of the lesser known companies. It had its origins in the Railway Foundry in Hunslet, Leeds and was

4 GCR 9H Class (LNER J10) No.832 built in February, This Pollitt design was the forerunner of the famous Pom Pom and continued in production until that design emerged in ANDREW DOW COLLECTION formed in 1846 but was taken over and became E B Wilson later in the same year. Another of the lesser known companies is Tulk and Ley. An iron mining company, in 1843 they established an engineering works at Lowca near Whitehaven. They are best known for building Table 1 - Locomotive Builders for the MS&LR and GCR Builder Build Period Number Built MS&L/MS&L(S)/GCR Beyer Peacock Neilson & Co/Neilson, Reid Kitson & Co North British Sharp Stewart Sharp Bros Vulcan Foundry Burnham, Williams R & W Hawthorn Yorkshire Engine Co William Fairburn & Sons Robert Stephenson E B Wilson W J & J Garforth Manning Wardle Fossick & Hackworth Sharp Roberts Kirtley Tulk & Ley Fenton Craven George England Rayne & Burn Crampton locomotives which had the single driving axle behind the firebox, enabling them to have very large driving wheels. The two locomotives purchased by the MS&LR were of that design. They were not successful. Rayne & Burn were agents and almost certainly sub-contracted the building of the locomotive credited to them to 1850 was a period of very rapid industrialisation and companies with some engineering expertise became involved in locomotive building. Some were successful but many were not. Steam technology had to be mastered as did the machinery and processes required to build a working locomotive. It is quite remarkable how much success was achieved in the embryonic industry. In 1846, Charles Frederick Beyer reported that one of his locomotives, No.25, a precursor of the famous Sharp Goods, had hauled 101 wagons weighing 597 tons over a distance of 29 miles at an average speed of 13.7mph. In the period between May, 1846 and October, 1847, the locomotive ran 40,222 miles with an average coke consumption (early steam locomotives used coke and not coal) of lbs per mile. These were prodigious feats from the earliest days of steam and no doubt gave the SA&MR the confidence to buy so many of the Sharp products in its earliest days. Of course, not everything was so successful. The first three

5 Table 2 - Locomotives built by Beyer Peacock for the MS&LR and the GCR Year GCR Class LNER Class Designer Wheel Arrangement locomotives purchased in 1841 from Kirtley were not a success. As was seen in the first part of this series, from 1858 onwards the independent builders fulfilled the role of building, repairing and maintaining locomotives when Gorton was full to capacity. Table 1 shows the list of locomotive builders and the number they built for the MS&LR/GCR from the beginning in 1841 to the end of 1922 when Number Built Sacré Sacré F N5 Parker 0-6-2T F N5 Parker 0-6-2T F N5 Parker 0-6-2T H J10 Pollitt H J10 Pollitt A D6 Pollitt F N5 Parker 0-6-2T G F2 Pollitt 2-4-2T O N5 Parker 0-6-2T A D6 Pollitt F N5 Parker 0-6-2T F N5 Parker 0-6-2T B C4 Robinson C B1 Robinson J J11 Robinson B5 Robinson B C4 Robinson C B1 Robinson J J11 Robinson F B4 Robinson G B9 Robinson H S1 Robinson 0-8-4T L C14 Robinson H S1 Robinson 0-8-4T Q B7 Robinson the GCR was absorbed into the LNER at the Grouping. From the total of 1845 locomotives built it is notable that the total of locomotives built at the Gorton Tank was 915 with a further 11 being built at the company s Sheffield locomotive shed (MS&LR(S)). The period over which the companies built the locomotives is also given in the table. From 1923 onwards the LNER concentrated locomotive building at Darlington and Doncaster and Gorton was relegated to a repair and maintenance facility. Most notable for the purposes of this item is the fact that Beyer Peacock heads the list of locomotives built by the independent builders at 282; far in excess of the nearest rival, the Neilson companies at 171. In the case of Beyer Peacock, who first built locomotives in 1855 for the Great Western Railway, the first locomotives for the MS&LR, four Class s designed by Locomotive Superintendent Charles Reboul Sacré (the son of a Huguenot refugee), were not built until (Note: These were not the same class as the Class 15s built by Burnham, Williams & Co in 1900 at the Baldwin Works in Philadelphia, USA. The MS&LR/GCR practice of re-using vacant class and locomotive numbers has been mentioned in these pages before). From that point on, orders from the MS&LR and GCR were intermittent with the pattern generally representing the periods of famine and feast for the independent builders. The full list of locomotives built by Beyer Peacock for the ML&SR and the GCR is given in Table 2 in date order. Manufacture covered locomotive design right from the earliest days of

6 Pollitt designed GCR Class 11A (LNER D6) No.871 built by Beyer Peacock in February,1899 at Manchester Central c1908, as rebuilt by Robinson. The locomotives were intended for the London Extension expresses. JOHN QUICK COLLECTION Sacré through to the first and second periods of Robinson s designs. The MS&LR/GCR used various titles for its engineers in charge of locomotive matters. For completeness they are listed below Richard Peacock William Grindley Craig Charles Reboul Sacré Thomas Parker Harry Pollitt John George Robinson It is not intended to discuss every design as that would take rather more space than is available but to concentrate on the more significant designs. Notable are the two designs of Sacré neither of which lasted into the LNER period. The Class 15 was an inside-framed locomotive. The four purchased in 1865 were originally destined for the Sardinian Railways. They were put to work on the North Lincolnshire lines. No more of the class were purchased by the MS&LR. The Class 23 was a double-framed goods locomotive and was the most numerous of Sacré s designs. 98 were built over the period from 1859 to 1867 with Beyer Peacock building a batch of 20 in It was a period of rapid increase in the railway s locomotive stock. The double frame design was much favoured by early locomotive builders including Richard Peacock. The frames were of the sandwich type with the two ½ plates either side of a 3½ wooden plank. By the time Beyer Peacock built another locomotive for the MS&LR the year was 1893 and locomotive design had moved on considerably. The class was the GCR 9F which, in its various developed forms, was classified N5 by the LNER. It was designed by Thomas Parker and was a development of his GCR 9A Class (LNER N4) of The 9Fs differed principally from the 9As by having Stephenson link motion instead of Joy valve gear and a Belpaire firebox instead of the previous round top design. In fact this was the first British locomotive design to adopt the Belpaire boiler and represented a major innovation by the ML&SR. This type of boiler was very widely adopted by the GCR and GCR Class 11A No.875 built by Beyer Peacock in March, 1899 at Trafford Park Shed c1918. Seen with a superheated boiler and a cast numberplate on the cabside as opposed to the painted version on No.871 above. REAL PHOTOGRAPHS

7 all British main line railways throughout the 20 th century. It is interesting to speculate how much Beyer Peacock influenced the choice of the Belpaire boiler as they had been building such boilers for the overseas market for the previous 20 years. The 9Fs were the most numerous of the GCR classes built by Beyer Peacock. From 1893 to were built, 79 by Beyer Peacock. Along with the earlier 9A class, 55 of which were built, the 9Fs were designed for short goods workings and shunting duties and spent much of their early years on coal and steel trains in the Sheffield area. After the Grouping in 1923, they were increasingly used on local passenger trains. They were essentially a tank engine version of the Class 9H (J10) goods locomotive with both classes of locomotive being built in a large acceleration of locomotive building to cope with the increased goods traffic on the railway and the shortfall of suitable locomotives. GCR Class 8B (C4) Jersey Lily No.194, built by Beyer Peacock on 23rd December, 1903 leaves Brackley Viaduct with an Up express c1905. LGRP12176/JOHN QUICK COLLECTION but continued the production of former Parker designs. It was not until 1896 that he produced locomotives of his own design; one of the first being the goods locomotive of Class 9H (LNER J10). Beyer Peacock were heavily involved in the production of these locomotives, 39 being produced in 1893 and 27 in As with the 9Fs the company built a high proportion of the total class numbers of and 1894 represented the peak in Beyer Peacock production for the ML&SR/GCR. After that, when locomotives were built for the railway, the numbers were at a much more modest level. However, production did continue and in 1898/99 they built 20 locomotives of the 11A (D6) class. The class was part of a long line of GCR development of the for express passenger use which culminated in 1919 with the Robinson Class 11F Improved Director. The development had begun in 1887 when Thomas Parker introduced his Class 2. It was the first GCR express locomotive to have inside frames. Readers will be familiar with the project to build a brand new Class 2, No.567 and thus see a Harry Pollitt became ML&SR Locomotive Engineer in 1894 GCR Class 9J (LNER J11) No.222 built in March, 1904 at Whetstone on 26th March, It is working a Down Class A goods; a London to Grimsby empty fish train. Whetstone station is behind the camera. KEN NUNN /LCGB

8 Edwardian elegance at its best. GCR Class 8F (LNER B4) No.1096 in pristine condition at Nottingham Victoria with an up train c1923. T G HEPBURN/RAIL ARCHIVE STEPHENSON significant point in the history of GCR locomotive development.. The Class 2 was followed in 1895 when Harry Pollitt introduced his Class 11. It was the first express locomotive in Britain to use a Belpaire boiler which had been developed by Beyer Peacock and had 7 0 driving wheels as opposed to the 6 9 wheels of the Class 2. GCR were desperate to have sufficient locomotives to operate the London Extension but unfortunately at the time, Beyer Peacock was embroiled in a long strike. The GCR put in place plans to start the building of some of the locomotives to be handed over to Beyer Peacock when the strike was settled. It is not clear how far this progressed as all 20 locomotives bore the Beyer Peacock works plate. The Class 11A (D6) was introduced in 1897 and differed from the Class 11 in having piston instead of slide valves. They were intended for the fast lightweight expresses on the London Extension. The previous 4-4-0s had been used on the Manchester - King s Cross expresses working to Grantham before being taken over by GNR locomotives. 33 locomotives were built with the first 13 built in the GCR workshops at Gorton. Beyer Peacock were contracted to build the last 20. The GCR 8G (LNER B9) 4-6-0, a small wheeled version of the Class 8F, at Lincoln shed on 19th July, 1924 with its LNER No.6108 and with GCR style numberplate on its cabside. It was built in September, 1906 and numbered A W CROUGHTON/RAIL ARCHIVE STEPHENSON In any review of GCR locomotives it would be difficult not to mention the ubiquitous 9J (J11) Pom Pom, 174 examples of which were built.

9 Since much has be said about this class in Main Line, suffice to say that Beyer Peacock built 25. One of the most famous of GCR classes was the 8B (LNER C4) of which Beyer Peacock built two in 1903 and a further five in The Atlantic wheel arrangement was used in perhaps J G Robinson s most celebrated design, noted for its exceptional aesthetic appearance. At the same time Beyer Peacock built two locomotives of GCR Class 8C (LNER B1) for direct comparison with the 8Bs which could, if found necessary, be converted to 4-6-0s. This never transpired, the 4-4-2s being very successful. The next class to come under the spotlight is the Class 8F (B4). These locomotives were introduced with the cutting of first sod for the new dock at Immingham and the first was named as such; the whole class being known by that port s name. All ten were built in a two month period in 1906 by Beyer Peacock so it might be interesting to debate how much it was a Beyer Peacock as opposed to a GCR design. They were certainly a very elegant design. They were intended for the fish trade from Grimsby and fast goods services from Immingham to London and were regular performers on the London Extension. They appear very similar to the Class 8 (B5) Fish engines, eight of which had been built by Beyer Peacock in 1904 but were in fact a smaller wheeled version of the Class 8C (B1). Although the Imminghams did perform on fish and goods trains, they were more often seen on passenger work. Also in 1906, again in a two month period, Beyer Peacock built all 10 locomotives of the 8G (B9) class. These were indeed a small wheeled version of the Class 8F the diameter of the driving wheels being reduced from 6 7 to 5 4 making the class much more clearly a goods locomotive. Also reduced was the length of the firebox coming down 9 to 7 9. Even with their smaller wheels they were still employed on fast goods trains. The GCR Class 8H (S1) was a brute of a machine intended for hump-shunting in the new marshalling yard at Wath on Dearne in South Yorkshire. They were based on the GCR s Class 8A (Q4) but had three cylinders to smooth out shunting moves and a wider boiler. They were also fitted with power reversers because of the frequent changes in direction inherent in shunting duties. Beyer Peacock built all four of the original locomotives in 1907/08 with Gresley building a further two, with modifications, in The Wath yard had two humps and the Wath Bankers as locomotives became known, shunted in pairs with two to each hump. In 1930, Gresley fitted a booster to one of the locomotives but the results were not entirely successful. It is sometimes said that there was petty friction between the GCR and Beyer Peacock but there was always close liaison between the companies. Together, they produced some very fine locomotives. The friction was no doubt that of two companies in such close proximity recruiting staff from the same area and no doubt staff moving across the tracks as opportunities in the two companies opened and closed. The friction cannot have been that serious as evidenced by the number of locomotives produced by Beyer Peacock for the ML&SR/GCR over a 57 year period. On the Grouping both Sir Sam Fay and John George Robinson themselves moved across the tracks. GCR Class 8H (LNER S1) 0-8-4T No.6170, a Wath Banker, at Mexborough shed on 13th April, Originally numbered 1170 it was built in December, A W CROUGHTON/RAIL ARCHIVE STEPHENSON