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I'VE donned my increasingly-used rose-coloured spectacles, writes Geoff Courtney, and all I can see when recalling coastal holidays in the south is constant sunshine, ice creams that tasted like nowhere else, and the absence of the word ‘stress' in anyone's lexicon. And, until July 9, 1967, steam, if you were lucky and in the right place.

It was on that summer Sunday that the Southern Region ran its last-ever steam train, a mixed van working out of Bournemouth hauled by Standard Class 3MT 2-6-0 No. 77014 of Guildford (70C), while earlier that day Merchant Navy No. 35030 Elder Dempster Lines had drawn into Waterloo from Weymouth with the region's last steam-hauled passenger train.

Holiday Haunts

Devon resident Jeffery Grayer has trawled through the Transport Treasury archive to produce a wealth of black-and-white images in Kent, East and West Sussex, Hampshire, Dorset, Devon and Cornwall, depicting motive power from West Country, Battle of Britain and Merchant Navy Pacifics to 0-6-0 and 0-4-4 tank engines.

There's also sea, of course, and one appealing image is of a handsome Standard Vanguard estate car towing a caravan off an Isle of Wight ferry at Lymington Pier station on August 26, 1954, under the watchful eyes of several people, including two fascinated youngsters.

Described by its compiler as an “unashamedly nostalgic collection,” the book also acts as a travel guide, quoting descriptions of the resorts from ‘Holiday Haunts', published by BR in 1958. Thus, the guide says that if Bournemouth could be said to approach perfection, “nature supplied most of it, skilfully and felicitously aided and abetted by the local authorities,” while Swanage is “favoured by nature and beloved by residents and visitors alike,” and Brighton is “the focal point of that delectable part of southern England known as the sunny south.”With that last description comes a stunning photograph from Howard Place above Brighton shed on July 1, 1951, showing the depot absolutely awash with steam engines.

Out-of-date shedplate

There is a twist to the cover photo, which depicts Battle of Britain No. 34089 602 Squadron at Ramsgate on February 2, 1952, having arrived with a train from London. The Pacific had been loaned to the Eastern Region the previous November to provide cover for the new Britannias that had been taken out of service for modifications following complaints from drivers that the driving wheels were shifting on their axles. During its stay north of the Thames, it was logged on the Down ‘Norfolkman' Liverpool Street to Norwich express on November 5.

The Bulleid Pacific was recorded as having been returned to the Southern Region in January 1952.

But the cover image taken a month later shows it still carrying a 30A (Stratford) shedplate.

Perhaps the men at Ramsgate (74B), to which shed the locomotive had returned, were happy reminding themselves of the time they helped out their east London fellow railwaymen.

NOSTALGIC SWEEP FROM KENT TO CORNWALL