RARE L&Y ‘COPS’ AT EAST LANCS GALA
‘Austerity’ becomes ‘A class’, as 752 debuts and ‘Pug’ makes outdoor appearance.
Four BR-liveried Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway locomotives could be ‘copped’ at the East Lancashire Railway’s Spring Steam Gala – but all their numbers were entirely fictional.
Newly overhauled Aspinall Class ‘23’ 0-6-0ST No. 752 made its debut in BR black at the March 6-8 event, carrying the number 51456, which it would have received had it stayed in main line use until nationalisation.
Its owners, the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway Trust, also shipped in their ‘Pug’ 0-4-0ST No. 19 from the Ribble Steam Railway for static display at Bury, with a temporary application of BR early emblems and the identity of scrapped classmate No. 51241.
In similar vein, Aspinall Class ‘27’ 0-6-0 No. 52322 masqueraded as No. 52345, the last of the class to be withdrawn from nearby Bolton shed in October 1962 – but visiting enthusiasts were baffled by the appearance of yet another BR black 0-6-0 tender engine carrying the number 52322.
It was converted Hunslet ‘Austerity’ saddle tank
Works No. 2890 ‘Douglas’, with black electrical insulation tape covering its red lining; the following weekend, it exchanged No. 52322’s identity for that of No. 52345.
Andy Booth, owner of both No. 52322 and ‘Douglas’, explained that the tongue-in-cheek makeover of the latter was done because “everybody thinks it’s the ‘A class’ anyway!
“The last time I was out on it, three people asked ‘why have you painted it in this silly fictitious livery with the number 2890?’”
As well as its ‘Lanky’ stablemates, No. 752 was reunited with two other old friends – Doris Blackledge and Lorraine Booth, whose grandfather William Brewer drove the engine during its period at Welch Whittle Colliery.
The Blainscough Coal Company, owners of the colliery at Coppull, acquired the locomotive from the LMS in 1937, and Mr Brewer drove it before his early death in 1949 as a result of having been gassed in the First World War while serving with the Coldstream Guards.
Every afternoon, Doris would wave to him from the level crossing close to her home – but the ELR gala was the first time she had
travelled behind the engine, and the first time she had seen it since the 1990s, when it was laid up at the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway awaiting overhaul.
A last-minute guest at the gala was GWR ‘64XX’ 0-6-0PT No. 6412 from the South Devon Railway, joining resident BR ‘4MT’ 2-6-4T No. 80097, Hudswell Clarke 0-6-0T No. 32 Gothenburg and Ian Riley’s ‘Black Five’ No. 44871. The ELR’s recently acquired ‘West Country’ No. 34092 City of Wells was unable to take part because it was receiving attention to firebox stays.
With a total of 1,779 passengers, ELR General Manager Tracey Parkinson said that this was less than the previous year’s event, but that takings had increased.
“There was loads of interest in the L&Y stuff, especially when the ‘Pug’ was shunted out,” she added. “It’s so cute!”