FURNESS RAILWAY TRUST GIFTED 1865 SADDLE TANK
Trust wants to complete preservationist Bert Hitchen’s ambition of restoring 1865-built locomotive.
Twenty years after it rebuilt its veteran 0‑4‑0 No. 20 from a saddle tank, the Furness Railway Trust has acquired classmate No. 25, for possible restoration to working order. The executors of the estate of the late Bert Hitchen, who died in May 2015, have donated the 1865‑built Sharp Stewart locomotive to the FRT, which is now making arrangements to transport the engine’s frames and other dismantled components from Carnforth to its base at the Ribble Steam Railway in Preston. Mr Hitchen, who acquired the locomotive in 2008, had begun restoring it to working order, and the FRT intends to prepare a conservation plan with the aim of completing the job. It is the younger sister of the trust’s 1863‑built ‘A5’ No. 20, the oldest working standard gauge steam locomotive in Britain, which recently returned to Ribble after a period on loan to Locomotion at Shildon, and whose boiler certificate expires on July 8. Six of the eight‑strong ‘A5’ class were sold out of Furness Railway service in 1870 and rebuilt as saddle tanks for the Barrow Haematite Iron & Steel Co. (BHSC), Nos. 20 and 25 becoming BHSC Nos. 7 and 17 respectively. Upon withdrawal in 1960, both were donated to local schools for display in their playgrounds, No. 20 going to George Hastwell School in Barrow and No. 25 to Stonecross School in Ulverston. Both later moved to Steamtown Carnforth, where the FRT acquired No. 20 in 1990, while No. 25 was plinthed near the entrance. Having rebuilt No. 20 to its original ‘A5’ condition in a Heritage Lottery‑funded project between 1996 and 1998, the trust plans to keep No. 25 in its industrial saddle tank form, to represent both periods of their careers. FRT Chairman Tim Owen said: “The trust is hugely grateful for this donation. We will have to wait for the conservation plan to be drawn up, but we hope to continue Bert Hitchen’s vision and restore the locomotive to working order as BHSC No. 17. “This would complement FR No. 20 – together the two engines would tell the remarkable story of these great survivors.”