STEAM DREAMS CHAIRMAN BUYS OLDEST STANDARD GAUGE HUNSLET
Steam Dreams Rail Co. chairman David Buck has acquired Hunslet 0-4-0ST Vigilant, the oldest surviving standard gauge locomotive from the Leeds firm.
Built by the Hunslet Engine Company in 1883 as Works No. 287, the engine is at Rocks by Rail’s Cottesmore site, where it has been partially restored.
It is the sixth steam locomotive in Mr Buck’s collection, in addition to ‘B1’ No. 61306 ‘Mayflower’, Peckett 0-4-0ST Works No. 1756 Hornpipe, Aveling & Porter 0-4-0WTG Works No. 8800 Sir Vincent, 5ft gauge Finnish ‘Pacific’ No. 1016 ‘Lady Patricia’ and Finnish 2-8-2 No. 1060.
While the main line-certified ‘B1’ is the regular motive power for many Steam Dreams tours, the Peckett, Aveling & Porter and ‘Pacific’ are kept on private running lines at his Berkshire home, while No. 1060 is displayed on another private line near Weeting in Norfolk.
Regarding Vigilant, he told Steam Railway: “It should be back running before too long – I want to complete the restoration as soon as possible, but I’m still deciding on the best way of doing that, so I don’t yet know how or where.”
Describing it as “a fun locomotive to have and with a very interesting history”, he confirmed that it will run alongside Hornpipe on his private line, “but it won’t stay here – I want it to move around other railways and be seen more widely.”
Named Vigilant by its original owners, the Cardigan Ironstone Company of Corby, the engine passed through the hands of several public works contractors, being renamed Trym around 1922 while in the ownership of Nott Brodie & Co. of Northampton.
Later part of the Sir Robert McAlpine and Sons fleet, it was sold to Howard Farrow Ltd of Hendon in 1940. Three years later, it was used in the construction of the GWR’s new marshalling yard and goods relief lines at Exeter.