Gresley prototype worksplate to go under the hammer
A WORKSPLATE from the prototype of the only class of electric locomotives designed by Nigel Gresley will go under the hammer at auction on November 12. It is from EM1 Bo-Bo No. 26000, which emerged from Doncaster Works in 1941 and carried the name Tommy after spending its early years on loan to the Dutch state railway Nederlandse Spoorwegen.
By the time he put his innovative skills to work on the project, Gresley was acknowledged as one of the country’s leading steam locomotive engineers – a reputation enhanced by the world-speed record achieved by A4 No. 4468 Mallard in July 1938 – and designed the EM1 for operating on the Woodhead route between Manchester and Sheffield.
The LNER started planning the electrification of the 41½-mile line, which ran beneath the Pennines and included the three-mile Woodhead tunnels, in 1936. The onset of the Second World War delayed the scheme, although by that stage a number of the gantries for the wires were already erected.
However, Gresley continued working on his design, and during his research visited South African Railways to inspect locomotive electrical equipment supplied to the company by Metropolitan-Vickers of Manchester, with which he was liaising on his prototype design.
The prototype locomotive emerged from Doncaster as No. 6701 in February 1941, thus heralding a new era in the LNER’s history just two and a half years after the last A4, No. 4469 Gadwall, was outshopped by the same works.
Testing was limited and the construction of further members of the class delayed due to the ongoing conflict, but in September 1945 the prototype was assigned the classification EM1 (Electric Mixed Traffic) and the following year renumbered 6000.
In September 1947 it was shipped to Holland to help ease that country’s postwar locomotive shortage, thus being able to undergo further testing in normal service, during which time it gained the unofficial name of Tommy, the nickname for British soldiers.
Gathering pace
With both the electrification of the Woodhead route and the construction at Gorton Works of a further 57 members of the EM1 class gathering pace, No. 6000 returned to the UK in February 1952. It was renumbered 26000 by BR and fitted with an official Tommy nameplate, with a plaque beneath explaining:“So named by drivers of the Netherlands State Railways to whom this locomotive was loaned 1947-52.”
The electrification of the route was completed in January 1955, and although designed by Gresley for mainly freight working, the 58 members of the EM1 class also turned their hand to passenger services, but this role ceased with the withdrawal of passenger trains on January 4, 1970. The last timetabled such run was made by No. 26056 Triton, one of 12 members of the class that had been given classical Greek names 10 years earlier.
The loss of passenger trains led to several class members being taken out of service, and No. 26000 was one, being withdrawn in March 1970 and after a period in storage was cut at Crewe in October 1972.
Freight operations continued on the line for more than 11 years after the end of passenger operations, but with the decline in coal traffic the end came for the route on July 18, 1981. The honour of operating the final train, a double-headed freight working to Manchester, went to Nos. 26006 and 26014, by then carrying their TOPS numbers of 76006 and 76014.
Although No. 26000 was scrapped despite it being the prototype of Gresley’s only class of electric locomotives, having operated in postwar Holland and being formally given an affectionate typically British name, one member of the class did survive, No. 26020, which is on display at the NRM as part of the National Collection.
‘Landmark’
The worksplate (works No. 1914) is being sold by GW Railwayana, whose auctioneer and principal Simon Turner told Heritage Railway:“While the EMI wasn’t Gresley’s highest profile class nor his longest lasting in service, it had its significance in that it was his only electric locomotive design and so something of a landmark during his 18 years as the LNER’s Chief Mechanical Engineer.
“Being the class prototype, the only member of the class built by the LNER, and for a decade the only member of the class, Tommy has its significance too, and I am greatly looking forward to putting one of its worksplates under the hammer.”
➜ See Geoff Courtney’s railwayana column on pages 70-72 for full details of the auction.