Long lost freight: Cattle trains
November 30 marks the 45th anniversary of the last cattle train to run in the UK. Steve Morris takes a look back at these interesting workings, with a focus on the trains operating out of Holyhead, the last part of Britain to be involved in such traffic.
THE movement of livestock by rail had started as far back as the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1831, transporting cattle from Ireland that had been landed at Liverpool. Other early workings included imports from the continent to the East coast ports, and internal movements of lean cattle or sheep from hill farms to low lying areas for fattening.
In the early 1900s, the principal flow was cattle for slaughter after being shipped from Ireland. By 1913, the ports with lairage for handling imported cattle were at Holyhead and Birkenhead from Dublin; Heysham, Fleetwood, Glasgow and Ayr from Greenore; and Bristol and Cardiff from Rosslare – the main objective being to keep the sea crossing as short as possible.
The main parts of this cattle traffic required the use of block trains from Holyhead and Birkenhead to London and other major cities, although livestock facilities existed at many stations throughout the countryside for handling smaller numbers of cattle, horses, pigs and sheep from markets on behalf of local farmers.
DEDICATED WAGONS
By the late 1920s there were more than
18,000 cattle wagons operating in the UK, with almost 12,000 inherited by British Railways at Nationalisation in 1948. BR then continued to build them for several years; an example of a later build being the 12-ton capacity two-axle BR ‘Oxfit’ Van, of which a batch of 1100 were built at Derby and Shildon during 1949/50.
The ‘Oxfit’ was something of a hybrid, with the body built to an LMS design but mounted on LNER running gear. Interestingly, it was equipped with steam heat through-pipes for use with rural branch line passenger trains, to which these vans were often attached. An eight-ton version was also produced, early designs having partitions to enable different animals to be carried in the same wagon.
As far as animal welfare goes it was necessary to ensure that the cattle, horses, pigs and goats were watered every 24 hours, although it was permitted to leave cattle and pigs unwatered if they reached their destination within 27 hours and sheep within 36 hours. Feed had to be provided at the time of watering. Imagine that being allowed today!
START OF THE DECLINE
Livestock transport in the UK reached its peak in the 1920s before losing out to road transport. The decline continued until the early 1960s, when BR had cut its livestock facilities from 2493 stations down to 232, with the focus being on the high volume import cattle traffic from Ireland.
The Irish traffic by then mainly comprised ‘store cattle’, which are young bullocks sold to other farmers for fattening prior to sale as ‘fatstock’ for slaughter. This trade amounted to around 750 wagonloads a week passing through the ports of Holyhead, Birkenhead, Fishguard, Heysham and Stranraer.
Movement of other livestock that used the same wagons had ceased and, by the mid-1960s, Holyhead and Birkenhead were the last places to see regular movement of cattle by rail. By the summer of 1962, a proportion of the cattle through Birkenhead had ceased using rail for onward transport, the regular service to the ex-Great Western Smithfield Goods Depot in London ending when the depot closed, although other trains continued to serve York until the late 1960s when the remaining Birkenhead traffic was lost to road.
Following this the only movement of cattle by rail in the UK was that operating out of Holyhead, any remaining small scale workings to local stations having ended some years before.
HOLYHEAD TRAFFIC
Holyhead had significant lairage facilities to handle imported cattle from Ireland in Kingsland, which was opposite the loco shed on the approach to Holyhead station.
Between 1930 and 1965, the Slieve Bloom –a ship with capacity for 640 cattle – operated between Dublin/Greenore and Holyhead. This was replaced for the final 10 years of the traffic by mixed cargo vessel the Slieve Donard, which had a slightly larger capacity.
On arrival at Holyhead, the cattle were offloaded and herded along a wide high-sided passage alongside the quay, over the carriage sidings (between the station and town area) via a ramp and overbridge to the town side of the yard, and then up to the lairage pens. Here they would be fed and watered before being checked by a vet.
A proportion of the cattle were moved by road to farms in the North West, whilst the majority were loaded eight to ten per wagon onto a train that normally departed late afternoon.
The vast majority of traffic in the 1960s was store cattle to York. The 1963 timetable included a 4N26/16.10 departure (Tuesday-Friday) to York, with a 4A21/16.40 to Broad Street (Saturdays-only) that carried fatstock for slaughter and sale at Smithfield market. The latter service ended in September that year, with the Saturday working then also heading for York with store cattle. In the early 1970s, the working had become a 6E66/17.05 departure from Holyhead (Monday-Fridays), but there were also additional special workings to the likes of Spalding and Manchester.
DIESEL TRACTION
Class 40s took over from steam by 1967 – a year in which no less than 143,000 cattle were imported via Holyhead, transported in lengthy trains of over 40 wagons.
Significant disruption to the service took place in 1970 as a result of the Britannia Bridge fire of
May 23 that year. However, it did manage to continue by using road transport to a temporary loading point at the disused Menai Bridge station, located just on the mainland, with a departure to York at 17.43 to fall in with the original path from Holyhead.
This arrangement continued until the bridge reopened in January 1972. By then 105,000 cattle had been handled this way, an excellent result given the circumstances, but somewhat reduced compared to normal.
Double-headed Class 24s had taken over by 1972, but by then volumes were starting to fall with only 73,000 cattle being handled in 1974.
The situation was not helped by disruption to the service caused by Welsh farmers in November that year, which followed their opposition to continued Irish imports when they were struggling to survive during a prolonged period of recession.
Things came to a head on November 4, 1974 with a police presence of 700 and 10 arrests resulting from attempts to prevent unloading of the ship. Then the railway line across Anglesey was even blocked at Ty Croes level crossing with tractors, 200 cars, Land Rovers and trailer loads of manure to disrupt the train itself.
THE END
Traffic continued to decline during 1975, with less frequent and shorter trains in the region of 25 wagons becoming commonplace and haulage being mainly in the hands of a single Class 24 or 25.
In early 1975, BR made a proposal to end the service on the basis that it was resulting in an annual loss of £450,000. The wagons dating from the
1950s were in need of replacement, with a figure of £1.8 million being quoted, as well as £200,000 for improvement in the dock facilities at Holyhead.
It was clear that BR had little interest in maintaining what had by then become a unique operation, and the alternative was to concentrate all Irish imports through Birkenhead where road transport was used for onward movements. Opposition came from the local MP Cledwyn Hughes and the Transport Users’ Consultative Committee for Wales, but this was finally rejected by the Government on Thursday, November 27.
The end came swiftly afterwards, with the final train being a special working from Holyhead to York in the early evening of Sunday, November 30, 1975 – thus ending 145 years of livestock transport by rail in Britain.
■ The author would like to acknowledge the following for help with this article: Dave Plimmer and his excellent 2d53.co.uk website; and Barry Wynne, Norman Kneale and the late Bill Rear for the photographic records.
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Late 1967 sees No. D5084 (24084) propelling a rake of empty cattle wagons into Menai Bridge yard. They had just been tripped from Caernarfon following cleaning, with the start of the Caernarfon branch seen to the left and the main line to Holyhead in the background on the right.