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RAIL REPORTS

Pick up a railway history book and you will find superlatives - the first locomotive, the highest station, the longest bridge or the fastest train. But what about the ordinary, everyday events that are also part of history? Those perhaps overlooked by the official historians, but captured by the average enthusiast who had the presence of mind to record the events around him. Events that might seem banal to contemporary observers but which are priceless today.

This feature is dedicated to those ordinary people with their notebooks - and sometimes cameras too - who recorded what happened the way they saw it happen. With all the attitudes of the time and without the benefit of hindsight.

The journey begins with an article in "Hardenhuish", the Chippenham Secondary School Magazine of Summer 1936. Written by my late father W.G. Drewett - then a 14 year old pupil - it is entitled

THE GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY EXPRESS PASSENGER SERVICE

The shape of the G.W.R. system is roughly triangular; the main terminus being Paddington; in the north, Liverpool, and in the south, Penzance.

The famous "Cornish Riviera" express , which runs between Paddington and Penzance, leaves Paddington at 10.30 a.m. and runs nonstop to Plymouth, a distance of 226 miles, in four hours and from there to Penzance. Two coaches are slipped at Westbury, two more at Par for Newquay, one at Truro for Falmouth and the last for St Erth at St Ives. The rest of the train, six coaches and two dining cars, works its way through to Penzance. The locomotive is one of the 4-6-0 "King" class.

The "Cheltenham Flyer" which was originally called the "Cheltenham Spa Express" was the world's fastest train when it was inaugurated. It leaves London every day at 3.55 p.m. and does the journey of over 77 miles in 65 minutes and sometimes less. On the run it attains the speed of well over 80 miles per hour. The locomotive is one of the 4-6-0 "Castle" class.

The latest long distance express is the "Bristolian" which runs between Paddington and Bristol. It leaves Paddington at 10 a.m. and does the journey of 120 miles in 105 minutes. The locomotive being a 4-6-0 "King" class.

The new streamlined railcars are one of the latest features of the express passenger transport. The streamlining reduces the wind resistance to about one-fifth of that of a square ended car. these cars, which weigh 20 tons, are 62 ft in length and have been designed for a speed of 60 miles per hour, though the maximum speed is 75-80 miles per hour. They seat 39 passengers each and are equipped with a 130 h.p. heavy oil engine, which burns non-inflammable fuel, and can be driven from either end.

Two locomotives have been streamlined also to reduce wind resistance. They are the 4-6-0 "Manorbier Castle" and the 4-6-0 "King Henry VII". It is often not realised that the wind resistance requires more power to overcome than the actual propulsion of the vehicle along the track.

6011 "King James I" at Loudwater in 1962

By the 1950s, when George Heiron painted this picture, the "Bristolian" was often a "Castle" turn

The GWR streamlined railcars evolved into the HSTs, Voyagers and Adelantes that we see today.

6014 "King Henry VII" soon lost its rather unscientific streamlining but kept the V-shaped cab to the end of its life.

OTHER NOTES

The slip coaches were needed so that the "Cornish Riviera" did not need to stop at intermediate stations. Once detached by means of special drawbar and vacuum brake couplings, the slipped portion would be brought to a safe halt at the next station under the control of a slip guard - who had the nearest railway equivalent job to a glider pilot! Once he had destroyed the vacuum to brake the train he had no way of re-exhausting the system. Basically he had to reach the waiting tank engine just right every time without running in to it!

The 77 mile route of the "Cheltenham Flyer" mentioned was the high speed leg to Swindon. The "Castle" would then proceed more slowly up the Stroud valley to Gloucester before the train reached Cheltenham behind a tank engine bearing an express headcode! "Kings" were barred from this route on weight and length grounds until modifications during the 1980s for the benefit of High Speed Trains.

The story goes that GWR Chief Mechanical Engineer C.B. Collett was told to produce a streamlined locomotive by the Board of Directors, worried about technical advances on the rival LMS and LNE railways. Collett, not best pleased by this directive, apparently sent his office boy into Swindon to buy Plasticene. When the lad returned, the CME then stuck bits of the modelling clay on his desktop metal model Castle and sent it to the Works with the order "build that!". The two 4-6-0s were also unusual in having straight rather than curved nameplates - a feature that would only re appear on Hawksworth "Counties" after World War II.

DEGREES KELVIN 2006

In contrast, here is how I typically write up my railway journeys 70 years later, with much more emphasis on individual vehicle numbers and locations. Departure, arrival and changing stations and haulage in bold.

LAMBETH WALK