‘DUCHESS’ TO JOIN 60007 IN CREWE CHARTER FOLD?
Talks held that might involve ‘Sutherland’ providing motive power for Saphos Trains.
Will Duchess of Sutherland be the latest engine to join the Crewe line-up?
“I’ve been approached”, confirmed the chairman of No. 6233’s owning group on September 2. However, the Princess Royal Class Locomotive Trust’s Graham Oulsnam continued with caution: “That’s all I can say – nothing’s happened.”
Locomotive Services, meanwhile, has declined to comment.
So, the shape that any deal might take is open to speculation, even assuming something were to come off – which is not yet the case.
Yet it’s being suggested that the Stanier ‘Pacific’ might find a place working with the Jeremy Hosking group in a similar way to that already agreed for ‘A4’ Sir Nigel Gresley. When No. 60007’s overhaul is complete, the ‘Streak’ is to haul trips for the LSL/Saphos Trains grouping, while being free at other times to do different things – such as running at its home line, the North Yorkshire Moors.
The benefits of that deal are simple: it gives Saphos a guaranteed engine, and ‘Gresley’ secure employment. Indeed, when his outfit announced it was signing up with Crewe early last year (SR489), Sir Nigel Gresley Trust chairman Nigel Wilson described the move as “a key agreement… underpinning the future finances and allowing us to develop engineering skills in a new generation.”
As this column pointed out at the time, it’s easy to see how such a template might work for other groups too; and that’s especially the case for those that rely on just one big engine for all their income. So might ‘Gresley’ just be the first… and the ‘Duchess’ the next?
If – and it clearly is still if – such a deal comes off for the big ‘red ’un’, Saphos would gain access to another 75mph machine, and one that’s pretty much as big and powerful as anything.
That would be pretty helpful right now: for while social distancing would have been a foreign concept to Messrs Stanier and Coleman when they designed the ‘8P’, with coronavirus around, going large on train sizes to keep passenger numbers up is de rigeur. With a ‘Duchess’, you’ll run out of platform before lacking enough grunt.
In more emotional terms, giving No. 6233 closer ties to the town in which it was built would also fill a gap in the Saphos line-up. (And what gricer doesn’t fancy the idea of a ‘Duchess’ based at Crewe, even if only some of the time…?). Despite steadily expanding
over the last few years and being able to call on ‘Pacifics’ from the LNER, BR and Southern, the promoter still hasn’t been able to field one from the LMS. Yet the Crewe constellation has repeatedly shown that it lacks neither ambition nor resource; such a deal would seem well inside its abilities.
However, look at this from the other end of any agreement, and the possibilities are intriguing – maybe beyond ‘Sutherland’ itself. For while the 1938-built No. 6233 is the only machine the PRCLT has put out on the ‘big railway’ in recent times, this is no single-engine owner.
Since 2002, the trust’s main effort has been taken up by keeping ‘Sutherland’ going – no small job with a 40,000lb tractive effort 4-6-2. Yet, until 1996, the trust’s working ‘red ’un’ wasn’t No. 6233 – but No. 46203. Princess Margaret Rose, now sitting in the outfit’s ‘West Shed’ HQ at Butterley. Plus, of course, there’s its pair of Riddles 2-6-4Ts, Nos. 80080 (at the East Lancs) and 80098 (under overhaul at the West Shed), neither of which have run on the main line in donkey’s.
Could such a tie-up with LSL change any of that – either by extending the arrangement to more engines, or simply by guaranteeing enough of an income for the ‘Duchess’ that it allows the PRCLT to think bigger, wider?
Despite the fact that it’s now nearly a quarter of a century since ‘Maggie Rose’ steamed, the West Shed outfit still says on No. 46203’s webpage that it “would like to carry out” an overhaul “some time in the future”. It’s a fine aspiration, but one that has, so far, always felt a way off. Yet now…?
Yes, we’re getting ahead of ourselves. None of this might ever happen. But tell me you think it couldn’t…