Russell is back on the Welsh Highland Railway main line
WELSH Highland Railway flagship and narrow gauge icon Hunslet 2-6-2T No. 901 of 1906 Russell completed a test run in preparation for the line’s July 30/31 special event, which marked the centenary of passenger services on the original WHR.
July 9 saw Russell make a rare excursion off its Welsh Highland Heritage Railway home line and onto the main Welsh Highland route for the test run.
The sole-surviving WHR steam locomotive, Russell’s previous venture on the main line was in 2019 for a series of shuttles between Pen-y-Mount and Beddgelert. For the centenary event this year, as highlighted in issue 295, it was set to operate shuttles between Dinas and Rhyd Ddu with the aid of England 0-4-0STT No. 4 Palmerston.
The test run saw Russell depart from Gelert’s Farm and join the WHR at Pen-y-mount Junction before venturing all the way to Beddgelert with a four-coach rake in tow.
Brake and gradient test
The run was undertaken to test Russell and some of the stock’s braking on the 1-in-40 gradient through the Aberglaslyn Pass approach to Beddgelert, though the inclines on the Dinas to Rhyd Ddu route are much easier.
A pause was made at Bryn-y-felin, one of the tighter curves on the railway, to check the locomotive ran through it smoothly. This particular curve had been relaid over the winter after a derailment at Sheepfold Cutting just before Christmas. After taking water at
Beddgelert and running round the stock, Russell returned to Pont Croesor, where Hunslet Barclay diesel LD9346/94 Emma – which had been stationed there as emergency rescue locomotive – was attached to the front and piloted the move across the junction onto WHHR metals.
In addition to the shuttle services, the centenary weekend event saw model railways, photographic exhibitions, a pre-1939 vintage car display and more at Dinas station. A former Whiteway bus shuttle ran from Dinas to three sites along the line ahead of the trains – Plas y Nant, Rhyd Ddu, and Waunfawr – to allow for photographic opportunities. An evening charter took place on the Saturday evening which saw Russell booked to travel between Dinas and Waunfawr, with an additional photographic stop at the old signalbox site at Tryfan Junction.
Russell was ordered new by the Portmadoc, Beddgelert & South Snowdon Railway Company before its line was ready (and was never completed) and set to work for the North Wales Narrow Gauge Railways Company until that concern, together with the PB&SSR Company, merged to become the Welsh Highland Railway in 1922. It was this centenary that was marked at the end of July.
In 1923, to allow through running over both the WHR and the adjoining Ffestiniog Railway, Russell had its cab and boiler fittings cut down to suit the latter’s restricted loading gauge. This move proved unsuccessful: afterwards, Russell was still too large and never worked through to Blaenau Ffestiniog. Following the closure of the line, Russell was requisitioned for the war effort in 1942 and to work on an opencast ironstone site near Hook Norton in Oxfordshire.
Poor track
After the war, Russell was sold by the Ministry of Supply to work in the clay mines at Norden on the Isle of Purbeck, but came to grief because of the poor track standards. It had its pony and trailing trucks removed in a vain bid to stop the derailments, but following severe damage to an axle in 1953, the locomotive was laid up.
It was bought by the Birmingham Locomotive Society and transferred to the Talyllyn Railway at Towyn. Hunslet repaired the damage for free and it eventually found its way to Gelert’s Farm. Russell got a new boiler in 1967, and its restoration was completed in 1987. Out of service again in 2003, it underwent another overhaul and on August 2, 2014, it hauled its first WHHR passenger train for 11 years.
➜ As previously reported, a competition sponsored by Heritage Railway and its sister publication The Railway Magazine, with a £500 prize, is being run to celebrate a second centenary, that of the opening of the WHR to Porthmadog over June 23-25 next year. The competition is inviting the best piece of original research on the history of the WHR and its predecessor NWNGR, including the personalities and customers involved. It is currently open for the registration of interest to submit an entry of between 3500 and 10,000 words, with a deadline of February
28. The winner will be announced during the centenary event. Full details of the competition’s rules may be obtained from nick.booker@ welshhighlandheritage.co.uk