CHANGEs ‘up to tHE wirE’ At mid-Norfolk summEr GAlA
Guest engine list in event brochure bore little resemblance to what ran on the day.
Visitors to the Mid-Norfolk Railway’s Summer Steam Gala received brochures seemingly for a completely different event, after changes to the guest engine list right up to the eleventh hour.
The glossy souvenir booklets detailed the histories of the line’s first choice visitors, Duchess of Sutherland and Union of South Africa – but the Stanier and Gresley ‘Pacifics’ were nowhere to be seen, their movement by rail to the MNR’s main line connection having been cancelled because the late confirmation of both engines for the gala meant that they could not be gauged in time.
Yet even the last-minute insert in the brochure, informing passengers about hastily arranged replacement ‘94XX’ 0-6-0PT No. 9466, turned out to be inaccurate – the Hawksworth engine also being unable to attend because of issues (subsequently resolved) arising from its recent sale to West Somerset Railway chairman Jonathan Jones-Pratt (SR494).
However, the MNR did secure a special guest on the Monday before the event, in the form of NER ‘T2’ 0-8-0 No. 2238 from the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. The North Eastern Locomotive Preservation Group’s engine was making only its third visit to another preserved line (following the Severn Valley Railway last year and the Great Central Railway in 2008/9) and what is thought to be its furthest ever foray south – although some of the class (LNER ‘Q6’) did reach East Anglia in the 1940s, working as far as Peterborough and March.
Changing the theme from ‘express passenger’ to ‘heavy freight’, the other guest engine secured with hours to spare was USA Transportation Corps ‘S160’ 2-8-0 No. 5197 – which was available at short notice because it was due to travel back to its Churnet Valley Railway home following its visit to the Epping Ongar Railway.
MNR general manager George Saville said: “Reid Freight had just delivered the ‘T2’, and we had to run up the yard and ask them to collect the ‘S160’ – that’s how up-to-the-wire it was.”
Both of the on-hire engines listed in the gala programme were present and in steam – BR ‘4MT’ 2-6-4T No. 80078 and Hunslet ‘Austerity’ 0-6-0ST No. 75008 Swiftsure – their duties including shuttles to Worthing Crossing, within a mile of the MNR’s target of North Elmham (see story below).
“I’ve got a few more grey hairs!” summed up Mr Saville, who added: “I think we still managed to pull off a reasonable gala, with the help of the NYMR, NELPG and [‘S160’ owner] Greg Wilson.
“The passenger numbers were down by about 10% on our target – but that wasn’t as bad as I was expecting, and it still made a little bit of profit.
“So one of my beliefs – that you need a locomotive with a big brass nameplate on the side – was proved wrong!”