Flying Scotsman’s GWR rival celebrates centenary
WHILE its class as a whole celebrated its 100th anniversary last year, March marked the centenary of GWR 4-6-0 No. 4079 Pendennis Castle with a weekend event of steam at its Didcot Railway Centre home before it set out on its travels.
Delivered new to Old Oak Common from Swindon on March 4, 1924, its working life saw it take charge of services to South Wales and the West Country. The following year it partook in the locomotive exchange trials, during which it was loaned to the LNER to compete against the company’s iconic A3 and A4 express locomotives, such as No. 4472 Flying Scotsman.
It successfully out-performed its rivals, the locomotive being described as having “covered itself in soot and glory”, which then resulted in the GWR sending Pendennis Castle to the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley that year with a notice that proclaimed it to be “the most powerful express locomotive in Britain” – a cheeky jab towards Flying Scotsman, also on display there.
No. 4079 was withdrawn in 1964 and would likely have been scrapped had Mike Higson not purchased it. It was stored at Taplow, where the Great Western Society’s Reading group rented the goods shed, and appeared at the September 1965 open day, before it was sold on to John Gretton and Sir William McAlpine, the latter also owning Flying Scotsman from 1973.
Pendennis Castle was moved and stored in the former Didcot depot’s lifting house; it is purported that the gantry crane there only survived as McAlpine would not allow the scrap man, who had been charged with dismantling it in November 1966, to cut it up around his engine and so paid him off.
Down Under
In 1977, the Castle was sold again, this time to Hamersley Iron in Australia, and it left UK shores on May 29 that year. For 17 years, No. 4079 ran excursions Down Under and in 1989 journeyed to Perth to sit alongside its old rival Flying Scotsman during the A3’s visit to the country. However, with prospects for an
operational future looking uncertain as traffic rapidly increased, Hamersley began to consider options for the locomotive’s future, not wanting it to become a standalone display. In early 2000 it was offered to the GWS, which agreed in return to arrange and pay for its repatriation and to restore it to operational condition.
After a formal handover on April 19, Pendennis Castle started a 10-week voyage home, arriving on July 8 (as reported in Heritage Railway issue 16) – 23 years, one month and eight days after it left. Its return journey meant it was the first 4-6-0 to circumnavigate the world – and is only the second steam locomotive to do so after its longstanding LNER rival.
Following a lengthy restoration, No. 4079 returned to steam at Didcot on April 2, 2022. Since, it has starred at several other railways’ gala events, with more visits set to take place throughout 2024.
March 2/3 saw Didcot Railway Centre celebrate the locomotive’s centenary at its home base with displays of more than 100 Castlerelated artefacts, including models, numbers and nameplates from scrapped and preserved classmates, and archive photographs.
Each morning, Pendennis Castle shunted around the former GWR depot, taking coal from the coal stage, lining up outside the locomotive shed alongside classmate No. 5051 Drysllwyn Castle and King class
No. 6023 King Edward II, before finally taking a spin on the museum’s turntable. Meanwhile, 0-4-0ST
No. 1340 Trojan and new Saint
No. 2999 Lady of Legend worked services on the two demonstration lines. In the afternoon, the Saint and Castle swapped places, allowing visitors a chance to ride behind the centenarian.
Event co-ordinator Sarah Jermyn said: “We had a great turnout, and it was great to see so many people coming to celebrate with us. Having more than 100 other Castle exhibits on show, including some rarely seen nameplates and numberplates, was fantastic.
“Our new beer, Pendennis 100, was launched, and the cake created by The Cake Lady of Oxfordshire was happily consumed. We were thrilled to welcome so many people to the museum to help us celebrate this landmark anniversary for a locomotive that is renowned for having outperformed Flying Scotsman in its lifetime.”
The Pendennis Castle celebratory weekend was the second major event for start of the 50th anniversary of the DRC, with the February half-term week having seen resident large prairies No. 4144 (operational) and No. 6106 (static display) joined by No. 5199, courtesy of the 5199 Project, which brought together an example of the 4100, 5100 and 6100 series of numbered locomotives together for the first time in preservation before No. 5199 was withdrawn for overhaul.