GNSR engine sheds: Aberdeen to Huntly
In the September 2021 issue we included the article ‘Great North of Scotland Railway engine sheds: Aberdeen to Huntly’ by Roger Griffiths and John Hooper. A complicated story that harks back to the earliest times of the railways, it is the work of many years and at times the information has proved frustratingly incomplete, and in some cases the sources can no longer be corroborated for clarification. As such, the authors gained the chance of a read through by two long-standing GNSRA historians and some of their comments were able to be adopted within the text, but not all, it was simply too late. With this in mind, the following letter has come to us from Roger Griffiths, with Ken Fenwick offering his overview of the published work. Both Roger and John are keen that corrections to any text should always be made through Tail Lamp, so we are grateful to them for coming to us with this, and of course to Keith for his information, so that we can endeavour to offer a greater understanding of the subject. The Editor Roger: Reference your article on GNSR locomotive sheds which has appeared in the latest Steam Days. It is good to see that a number of the comments which we suggested have been incorporated. We are both longstanding members of the GNSR Association which was established in 1964 and which then has meticulously researched and documented the company. I therefore offer the following observations on Waterloo, Inveramsay and Dyce. Waterloo – Company records contain no reference to a locomotive shed at Waterloo. The photo on page 40 shows a goods shed. A locomotive shed would not have been so high nor so wide. There is a huge space between the doors in the ends and the side wall. The map on page 39 is certainly a mystery with two goods sheds compared with the map on the following page. However, the tracks to both sheds have wagon turntables at both ends. A further point is that there is no facility for turning locomotives at Waterloo. Inveramsay – the GNSR Minutes clearly state that the shed there was for carriages. The original wooden one was blown down and replaced by a stone shed. It is identical to the carriage shed at Alford and lacks the usual ventilation holes, usually circular, in the end wall which are a feature of locomotive sheds at Fraserburgh, Peterhead and Boat of Garten. The roof is also lower than in locomotive sheds. The branch timetable shows that all workings started from Macduff; there was no need for locos to be stationed at Inveramsay. But why was a carriage shed needed? I cannot answer this with certainty but spare stock was kept at various places and covered accommodation provided for coaches as the varnish of the day did not stand up well to Scottish weather. The Highland partly solved the problem by the use of tarpaulins to cover the carriages. Dyce – As with Waterloo, there is no reference in the records to a locomotive shed here. All Buchan workings are shown as operating to and from Aberdeen. There is an interesting sentence in the BoT Inspection Report for Dyce to Maud dated 21 July 1861 ‘No turntable had been erected at Dyce Junction, but he was informed that all trains for the Formartine & Buchan Railway were to run from Aberdeen station and also that an engine turntable was to be erected at this junction in the event of that at Aberdeen getting out of order’. That would explain the turntable shown on the map. It may not have lasted long and was not recorded in 1887, the date of the first Appendix which we have. That does not explain the shed shown in the map, but again that could have been a carriage shed for spare stock. Keith Fenwick (by email) Finally, a few thoughts from Roger Griffiths: Waterloo: Why two goods sheds indeed, and why did one of them disappear after rearrangement/enlargement of Kittybrewster shed? Agreed, the photo of the shed at Waterloo was the original goods shed, having been wrongly captioned on the back of the print. It would be unwise to assume the second building at Waterloo – be it an engine shed or a second goods shed – would have looked the same, probably being of less robust construction in the knowledge that it would have a relatively short life. In regard to Inveramsay, our thanks to Keith for putting things straight at this location. We did not have the photographic evidence, having been told many years ago by Lens’ senior cataloguer that he had seen a picture of ‘a two-road engine shed at Inveramsay’. So for our purposes we downgrade the location to an engine turning and servicing point. Finally, could the situation at Dyce be similar to that at Inveramsay?