Bear to Bucks – new life for oldest surviving Peckett
PRESERVATION’S OLDEST surviving Peckett – 1896-built 0-4-0ST Works No. 614 Bear – is moving to a new home for the first time in over 50 years: the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre.
The ‘W4’ class saddle tank has been based at Kemsley Down on the Sittingbourne & Kemsley Light Railway since 1971, and has spent the last 50+ years stored in the open air, during which time its condition has deteriorated. Having determined that they were unlikely to ever restore Bear, the SKLR trustees decided in 2023 to transfer ownership of the locomotive; following several approaches, the locomotive was donated to the Quainton Railway Society at the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre, which aims to return
Bear to service after an initial cosmetic restoration.
“Bear is expected to leave the railway before we reopen at Easter. It will be sad to see the engine go but it is going to a good home as part of the Quainton Railway Society’s collection of industrial railway locomotives at the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre,” the SKLR said.
Bear was originally built for William Beardmore & Co. Ltd’s steelworks in Mossend, North Lanarkshire; the company was subsequently taken over by Colvilles Ltd in 1934. Bear is somewhat unusual in that it is a hybrid of two manufacturers, having been rebuilt by Andrew Barclay in 1941, acquiring the works number 5997. After Colvilles was subsumed by British Steel in 1967, Bear was donated to the Locomotive Club of Great Britain and initially stored at the Scottish Railway Preservation Society’s base at Falkirk before moving down to Kent, after the Kent branch of the LCGB took over running of the former Bowaters Paper Railway.