Trains of thought
This month, in our series of articles profiling specific steam locomotives, we take a look at the life and times of ‘King Arthur’ class ‘N15’ 4-6-0 No 30451 Sir Lamorak. Usurping a lingering Urie plan to rebuild ten Drummond 4-6-0s as mixed traffic ‘H15s’, ‘N15s’ Nos E448-457 were, in fact, Urie-pattern locomotives with Maunsell/Clayton modifications, and Sir Lamorak was one of the first five to be erected. They were built at Eastleigh to the L&SWR loading gauge, their Drummond/Urie cabs restricting them to working the Southern Railway’s Western Section. Of the five engines completed in the late spring and early summer of 1925,
Sir Lamorak was the last to be withdrawn, in June 1962.
My own memories of the ‘King Arthur’ class 4-6-0s take me back to the 1950s when this particular batch of ‘Arthurs’ was allocated to Salisbury, from where they worked Waterloo-Exeter trains. Sadly, I never saw any of the first five built from 1925 as most of our family holidays in the late 1940s and early 1950s were taken in Bournemouth, where I saw Nos 30736 to 30754 as these were based on the Bournemouth line at that time. In fact, these earlier-built engines (new between August 1918 and February 1923) were modified from 1928 with new reduced diameter cylinders.
Both as a young schoolboy and throughout my life, although my family spent many summer holidays in Bournemouth, I was never one for sitting all day on the beach. I preferred to be doing something, like spending time on Bournemouth station or travelling around on trolleybuses. Even now, I find it hard to relax, otherwise why am I still working as many hours as I do at 87? As a young trainspotter I was always fascinated by the names of locomotives and their origins, and Bournemouth was a great place to witness many named locomotives, like
‘King Arthur’ and ‘Lord Nelson’ class 4-6-0s, ‘Schools’ class 4-4-0s and Bulleid Pacifics, and those named after the Knights of the Round Table were no exception.
Browsing through my Ian Allan abc at the time, and seeing the list of engines in the class named after Knights of the Round Table, until then I had not realised that there were so many Knights having seen images of the Round Table with limited seating. In his writings, Sir Thomas Mallory only very briefly mentioned some of the names that were selected for use by the Southern Railway for its ‘King Arthur’ class, and some engines of the class even carried the names of ‘Ladies of Legend’, such as Linette, sister of Lady Lyonnese. Of all the ‘Ladies’ that the Southern Railway selected to grace its engines, it is surprising that Morgan le Fay was not chosen, as she was King Arthur’s sister. However, when the names of the ‘King Arthurs’ were later given to the Southern-based BR Riddles ‘5MT’ 4-6-0s, Morgan le Fay was included, on No 73112.
Since producing Steam Days magazine over the years since 1993, I have learned a great deal about specific locomotives and the people and places that locomotives were named after in our ‘Locomotive Names & their Origins’ and ‘Life and Times’ articles – a history lesson in themselves – and I hope that all our readers find these features interesting too. Please continue to enjoy your read and recall your own special memories.