‘Brief Encounter’ at Achnasheen

Eric Stuart shines a spotlight on a long-standing restaurant car exchange at an isolated station on the Kyle of Lochalsh route, a very busy 15 minutes.

Travelling by train today, if one wants refreshments, grabbing a coffee and a muffin from a kiosk before boarding is common practice. Provision of refreshments on the train is however, becoming increasingly rare, unless one travels on a longdistance service. With metro-type trains on Thameslink services these days, it might seem extraordinary that one could travel throughout the day to places like Cambridge, Brighton and the South Coast and obtain a good variety of refreshments on board. There were a number of buffet car trains (and occasionally restaurant cars) to and from Cambridge, whilst an almost hourly service of Pullman car trains linked London with many of the south coast towns. In both cases, a substantial meal was often available, but not just main line trains provided a meal service, secondary lines often boasted at least a buffet service. Of course, in steam days the journey times tended to be longer than they are today, but some rural journeys are still long enough, and where a meal en route would be welcome.

Our feature shows the way in which such a service was provided on one of the lines in Scotland, whilst seeking to do so as economically as possible. For much of the year there were only two through trains a day between Kyle of Lochalsh and Inverness. These trains left their termini at roughly the same time as each other, travelling in the opposite direction and passing each other on the way. The morning pair of trains did this at the rather lonely crossing station of Achnasheen, 46½ miles from Inverness and 35¾ miles from Kyle. By dint of a swap-over of a restaurant car there, lunch could be provided on both the mid-morning trains with one car and crew. The service was duly shown in the public timetable as ‘RC

Inverness to Achnasheen’, and vice versa. Photographs from Thursday, 11 September 1958 show how it was achieved.

This ‘Brief Encounter’ at Achnasheen was a long-standing arrangement that took about 15 minutes each weekday. Just think; if housewife Laura Jesson (Celia Johnson) and Dr Alec Harvey (Trevor Howard) had met at Achnasheen rather than Carnforth, this activity might have been much better known, so we can address that now.

Based on the 1958 timetable (the operation dates back to at least summer 1954 and timings remained much the same for many years), the 10.45am up service from Kyle of Lochalsh to Inverness arrived first, with the locomotive, usually a Stanier ‘Black Five’ class 4-6-0, coming to a stand alongside Achnasheen West signal box, with its tender beside the water column. Once any goods and mail had been loaded/unloaded into/out of the leading van, the train would restart, shunting forward so that its tail end vehicles cleared the station’s passing loop, on this occasion travelling little more than the length of two carriages to achieve this. The locomotive was then uncoupled and moved forward to the Inverness end of the passing loop, halting beside Achnasheen East box. As it did so, the 10.30am down service from Inverness arrived at the opposite platform. The crew of the locomotive of the down train, another ‘Black Five’, would probably take the opportunity to take on water whilst waiting.

The single-line east having been cleared, the locomotive from the 10.45am up service moved into the section, stopped beyond East signal box and then reversed along the down line leading to the rear of the waiting down train, where the restaurant car would have been uncoupled from the rest of the rake. The locomotive was then coupled onto the restaurant car, and the ‘Black Five’ then retraced its steps to add this 12-wheel vehicle to the front of its up train.

In one photograph, a member of staff can be seen at the Inverness end of the gangwayed full brake at the head of the up train, standing on the footboard and holding on to a handrail ready to connect the coupling, corridor ‘bellows’ etc, as the restaurant car is propelled towards him – would such a precarious position be considered safe today?

Freed of its restaurant car, the down train departed from Achnasheen for Kyle of Lochalsh. The summer 1959 working timetable states that the 10.30am ex-Inverness is only at Achnasheen from 12.32pm for four minutes, so it was a swift operation. With the restaurant car now coupled to the front of the stock, the up train left Achnasheen at 12.38pm. By this slick manoeuvre, passengers on the down train – who may well have come from south of Inverness – were able to have an early lunch, finishing their coffee promptly so as not to find themselves heading back whence they had come, whilst those from

Kyle could have a lunch from about one o’clock.

Meanwhile, the small bus seen in the first picture, its rear compartment for mails, would be returning to Gairloch, Aultbea, and Laide. Operated by the Achnasheen Hotel Co Ltd, post-1930 successors to the McIver family who originally won the Royal Mail contract for the route, it had set off for Achnasheen that morning and, after connecting with both the up and down trains, was now taking mail and passengers on its return journey northwest, on a very picturesque route.

A few more points of trivia. In the mid1950s, part of the Kyle line and a station were to be flooded as part of a reservoir for a hydro-electric scheme: a new line and station at Lochluichart were opened on 3 May 1954. Until the mid-1950s, the restaurant cars on these northern lines could be one of the former Caledonian Railway Pullman cars, converted to restaurant cars. For a few years from 1961, during the currency of the summer timetable, one of the former ‘Devon Belle’ observation cars plied the InvernessKyle of Lochalsh line, running in the down direction in the morning and returning on the evening train from Kyle to Inverness, leaving at about 5.30pm. The ‘Devon Belle’ observation car had a small bar counter and the trains on which it operated were advertised as having a miniature buffet, as, when the observation car was in operation, its buffet-bar was used to provide drinks and snacks, another facility I used. Happy days!

This service was on hand to those who had paid the observation car supplement, 3s-6d in 1961, and the restaurant car service continued to operate, including the ‘changeover’ at Achnasheen. However, there was now a complication at the start and end of the summer period. Taking the 1961 summer season as an example, the timetable ran from Monday, 12 June 1961, and until the 30th of that month the outward journey for the observation car was on the 10.30am ex-Inverness, the same train as the restaurant car. This presented a complication in regard to the restaurant car ‘exchange’, as the observation car was, of course, the last vehicle in the train, so passengers could enjoy the rear view. The solution appears to have been to marshal the restaurant car directly behind the down engine at this time, and this locomotive (a diesel, as Kyle of Lochalsh was closed to steam from 10 June 1961) was used to shunt the vehicle on to the rear of the up service. As of Saturday, 1 July an additional summer service began operating at 9.15am from Inverness, and the observation car used this through its duration, and then reverted to the 10.30am service from Monday, 28 August through to the end of the timetable period on 10 September.

Another oddity of past times was the wooden letterbox in the guard’s van of the evening train from Kyle. At the intermediate stations, people visited the guard’s van to post letters, which were passed to postal staff when the train arrived at Inverness, along with bagged mail collected from all over the area. As the train driver could often not see the guard on the 5.30pm train, the guard gave the ‘right away’ by two short, sharp applications of the brake from his van, the driver seeing this register in the cab and responding with a blast on the horn. Sadly, changes in postal distribution ended mail by rail hereabouts, with the long-serving interaction at

Achnasheen whereby the post from the south was transhipped to a bus was lost in September 1997 – Highland Omnibuses took over the hotel’s transport operations from March 1965, and a Royal Mail postbus covered the job from January 1976. Likewise the outgoing mail was thereafter just by road. By then the Achnasheen Hotel had suffered a fire, in February 1994, and it was not replaced. There has been no direct replacement for the postbus, although Westerbus can take you from Achnasheen to Aultbea and Laide.

With thanks

My thanks to Am Baille/Highland Life (especially Alisdair Campbell) and to the Highland Railway Society and Transport Treasury for the 1958 photographs, and to the MacBraynes Circle (especially George Hawkings and Phil Drake) and Graham Martin-Bates of the Scottish Vintage Bus Museum for information about the bus service. I am interested in unusual train features, past and present, such as those mentioned here, so am always pleased to hear from anyone who has news of such.

Roy Hobbs/Transport Treasury At around 12.23pm on 11 September 1958 the 10.45am Kyle of Lochalsh to Inverness service has just arrived at Achnasheen. The starting signal is in the off position to allow the Stanier ‘Black Five’ to move up, initially a few yards with the whole train (but then light engine to the advanced starter at the end of the loop), the signalman of Achnasheen West box ready for when the train and station staff have completed their duties – they still have the doors of the luggage van open to load/unload items. Milk churns are just in view, and an Achnasheen Hotel Co bus is parked up with its rear available for goods and mail access. Presumably, some other passengers, mail and goods will have arrived by bus to join the two trains that will soon cross in the station’s passing loop.

Roy Hobbs/Transport Treasury A view from the down platform records the Inverness-bound train on arrival, the 4-6-0 just ahead of the staff-only wooden footboards betwixt platforms. The full brake is a 50ft steel-sided LMS variant, 8ft 6in wide and the maximum 9ft across the centrally-placed guard’s duckets. The guard had a seat beside these and may find himself surrounded by mail and parcels, the van being open plan, so its use is perhaps surprising given that mail was being carried and that passengers passed through the vehicle when it was marshalled in the middle of a train with a restaurant car, as would soon be the case here. Perhaps the lingering pedestrian on the lattice footbridge is Hugh Davies, who went on to photograph much of the shunt from that position. Meanwhile, a member of the station staff crosses to the down platform in readiness for the impending arrival of the 10.30am Inverness to Kyle of Lochalsh service.

Highland Railway Society Collection/H Davies Looking east from the footbridge, the train has now drawn forward, clearing the points at the Kyle end of the loop and, one assumes, allowing easier uncoupling of the locomotive, and likewise the later coupling up of the restaurant car. The ‘Black Five’ has proceeded to the end of the loop and waits at the advanced starter for its next move. A healthy number of wagons occupy the goods yard, and while many of the Kyle line stations lost their goods services in 1964, that at Achnasheen lasted until August 1983. In the late 1950s the line was served by a combination of goods and mixed duties. There appear to be some passengers awaiting the down train, or people waiting to meet arriving passengers. Staff are also on hand, and two enthusiasts linger at the platform end, the gentleman in the light shirt being Roy Hobbs, who was eyeing up a wander for his next photographs.

Roy Hobbs/Transport Treasury The ‘Black Five’-hauled 10.30am Inverness to Kyle of Lochalsh service passes Achnasheen East box and the waiting classmate from the 10.45am up service. Impressively, just four minutes was booked at Achnasheen for the down train, hence the locomotive from the up working being poised ready to collect the last vehicle from the incoming working – the restaurant car. Sadly, the identity of the two ‘Black Fives’ eludes us – there were about 35 of the class allocated to Inverness shed at this time. The signal boxes and semaphores at Achnasheen would ultimately be decommissioned with the introduction of Radio Electronic Token Block (RETB) in 1984.

Roy Hobbs/Transport Treasury With the down train mid-shunt, with ‘Black Fives’ at each end while the restaurant car is coupled to the nearest engine, this view shows the railway in its landscape. We are seeing the busiest time at an otherwise quiet spot, but the railway here may have been busier. The Loch Maree & Aultbea Railway was fully surveyed in 1892, with Achnasheen the proposed junction, but the scheme failed to receive parliamentary approval. Left to road vehicles to provide the link, Gairloch enjoyed a horse-drawn bus service from Achnasheen pre-1900, and an Albion motorbus was used from 1909, with extension to Laide perhaps from 1914 and certainly by October 1922 (when advertised by the Highland Railway as a connection). As for the Achnasheen-Laide postal service, that was in the hands of the McIver family before Murdo died in 1930, and then the hotel and transport business was sold as a going concern, the new owners operating as the Achnasheen Hotel Co Ltd and buying three new vehicles between 1943 and 1954.

Highland Railway Society Collection/H Davies At the Kyle end of the station, the down train has moved forward to bring the rear of the train (apart from the restaurant car) into the platform. Both these services are noted in the working timetable for summer 1959 as carrying mail, the up train as far as Dingwall (arrive 1.43pm), and on Saturdays the same up service called at Imber House, Balnacra Level Crossing, Gatehouse, Craig Houses and Luib Houses to ‘take up the wives of railway employees’. Beyond the ‘Black Five’ we glimpse a lattice girder span of the River Bran bridge, while the prominent peak is An Liathanach (1,561ft). Both rail and road to Kyle of Lochalsh pass to its south, with the road to Kinlochewe and ultimately Gairloch, Aultbea and Laide on its north. Achnasheen station was opened by on 19 August 1870, and Murdo McIver was running the Station Hotel from 1871 – in due course he won the business to transport mail to and from the station.

Highland Railway Society Collection/H Davies There is now much activity at the Inverness end of the down platform: passengers alight, barrows are on hand, and unloading has begun. One member of staff is lugging sacks of incoming mail towards the camera, and staff prepare to uncouple the restaurant car from the rear of the train. Meanwhile, having photographed the incoming train passing East box, Roy Hobbs is seen in the field above the downside shelter. The land rising to the left climbs to Fionn Bheinn, a munro of 3,060ft, and the main road to Dingwall goes virtually unseen beyond the goods yard, the railway sharing Strath Bran with the road at this point. The mail will be from Inverness and also from further afield, trains with mail from Glasgow, Perth, and Aberdeen all incoming to Inverness by 10.12am.

Graham Martin-Bates Collection This Bedford OB with Mulliner B25FM body (a 25 seat front entrance bus with mail compartment) was in the Achnasheen Hotel Co fleet from July 1949 until withdrawn in September 1960. In early BR (Scottish Region) timetables there is a ‘Motors’ section for connecting buses, the summer 1949 issue noting two at Achnasheen. The main service was LaideAultbea-Poolewe-Gairloch-Loch MareeKinlochewe-Achnasheen – departing at 9am and arriving at 11.45am, with return at 1pm (times for June onwards), the distance being 43 miles. The other service was the 9.55am from Torridon, south of Kinlochewe, this bus being at Achnasheen between 11.05am and 1pm, before returning, so both buses met the mid-morning trains from Inverness and Kyle of Lochalsh. By 1955 the bus times were no longer in the timetable. With mail bags at the rear, CCS 339, most likely in a scarlet and primrose livery, is parked by the main Achnasheen station building, which is hard up against the hotel. The corrugated metal building is Achnasheen Post Office.

Roy Hobbs/Transport Treasury Having collected the restaurant car, the ‘Black Five’ heads off toward Achnasheen East box and reversal. The coach is a restaurant second designed by William Stanier and built at Derby in 1933. It is a Diagram 1901 (Lot 733) vehicle, very similar to Diagram 1861 (Lot 685) but with deeper window ventilators. They were mounted on six-wheel bogies, were built as restaurant thirds and had five bays and 30 seats, but no luggage or lavatory accommodation. Ten of each type were built, Nos 101-110 (Lot 685) and 111-120 (Lot 733), but 13 were used as wartime ambulances and never returned to everyday service. Of the seven remaining, No 103 was withdrawn in 1953, leaving Nos 101, 102 and 111-114. Four of the seven would be gone by the end of 1962, and the final two, Nos SC113 and SC114, at the end of 1963.

Highland Railway Society Collection/H Davies A few minutes have passed. The down train has departed, and the locomotive of the up train is propelling the restaurant car towards its train, where the shunter is preparing to couple up to the luggage van. Soon, all will be over, until tomorrow, the exchange of restaurant car being a weekday routine. From here the passengers will be able to enjoy lunch on the train, although any patrons of the restaurant car will have to make their way through mail bags and assorted parcels and sundry traffic in the brake vehicle. As for Achnasheen, once the connecting bus service had left, an air of tranquility returned, with no passenger services booked between the 12.38pm restart of the 10.45 ex-Kyle of Lochalsh and arrivals of the 5.40pm from both Kyle and Inverness.