Carriages and Wagons of the Shropshire and Montgomeryshire
Click on the images to see the larger pictures
The S&MLR was in many ways created in a most unusual way, even by Stephens’s railways standards, and rolling stock procurement was no exception. In a reversion to early Victorian practices under the terms of their contract the ‘Contractors’ (Stephens and the company solicitor Matthews) building the railway had to supply the rolling stock to run the railway. As a consequence there little by way of records and no trace in the Board minutes, of the acquisition of the necessary items.
The Midland Coaches
For
the opening, the railway was supplied with a batch of fully refurbished
second hand coaches of Midland Railway origin, freshly fitted with acetylene
lighting to Stephen’s specification. There were four bogie carriages
and two 4 wheeled brake vans.
Vans No. 1 and 2 were D529 25ft passenger brake vans, either MR built at Derby in 1877-1894 or, less likely, one of a small batch built for the Midland & Scottish Joint Stock in the same period. Van No. 1 was piped for steam heating and had the end windows probably fitted later by the S&MLR. Inexplicably one brake disappeared from stock returns in WW1, and it is possible that this was a casualty of the bad derailment on Shrawardine bridge in July 1915 when one of the Midland brakes was in the train. The returns show a passenger brake reappearing in 1924. This may be the arrival of the North London van (No 18) mentioned below .However, to venture into the realms of speculation, it may be that No 2 van, which was recorded as had been installed as a p/w van at Nesscliff (where it was recorded as remaining till at least 1960), was not the ex Midland van ( for which photographic evidence is in any event lacking ) but mis-description of a very old passenger brake, which from its design was c1850 and might have been a survival from Potteries days.
Of the carriages Thirds Nos 3 & 4 were MR Drawing 490 43ft thirds
of a type built at Derby from 1882-1885. Composites Nos 5 and 6 were of
similar in appearance but there are however several candidates for their
precise design. The most likely is MR’s 40ft brake composite of
lot 69 to Drawing 332 built at Derby 1882, the original layout of which
was 3rd, 3rd, 1st, 1st, 3rd, brake. Drawing 332 was an 1870s design modified
under lot 69 to vehicles with iron framed bogies with elliptical springs
and a former luggage compartment space was utilised for a guard. In 1883
more of the luggage composites were built at Derby to lot 83. Many of
both lots had the 3rd class compartment adjacent to the brake/luggage
space incorporated in guard’s compartment, to make it larger, although
there was no change to their external appearance. No. 5 is probably a
lot 69 compo brake whilst No. 6 could be a modified carriage from any
of the batches.
These vehicles were reported at the time to have been painted crimson lake, probably full Midland livery, no doubt at Derby before being sold. Certainly the style looks very similar to that used by the Midland. The basic Midland livery was light grey roofs, crimson lake sides and ends. Raised beading was black edged with gold leaf; the latter edged either side vermilion. Letters were gold, shaded red, shadow shaded black. Iron work was black as was the running gear. Interior seating was first class blue cloth and third crimson plush. All would have been oil lit as new but replaced by Pintsch oil gas from the late 1880s and Stephens had this replaced with his favoured acetylene gas system.
The LSWR Carriages
Latter in 1911 six 4 wheeled carriages were obtained from the batch of ex L&SWR coaches that Stephens had obtained in 1908 for the opening of the PD&SWJR’s Callington railway; there were three 5 compartment thirds, one 2x1st /3x3rd composite and 2 three compartment 3rd Brakes.
In
the absence of accurate dimensions the precise details of these carriages
must remain uncertain. The brake 3rds (Nos 10 &12) and, 5 compartment
all thirds (Nos 7 , 8 & 11) were almost certainly from the 28 ft carriages
from the 1879 Block Sets built to Diagram 2577 and 2570 over the period
1879-85 although the brakes had lost the guards ducket or ‘birdcage’
top with which they would have been built. However the composite (No 9)
is more of a puzzle and the author has not been able to identify a photograph
of it. It may well be a 32ft composite that was originally a six wheeler
tri-composite built at the same period as the other carriages, but unless
and until more is known this must remain a guess.
One interesting feature of these LSWR coaches is that some, if not all, were fitted with extra horizontal grab handles under the windows. This may well have been to assist guards walk between compartments for ticket issue, a somewhat disreputable practice common to most Stephens railways. This was often alleviated by cutting internal corridors in coaches, something that does not appear to have occurred in the SMR.
The livery of the LSWR coaches on arrival is uncertain. They probably carried their PD&SWJR livery for a time and may then have been repainted in ultramarine with vermillion ends and cast metal lettering painted yellow, a livery that seems to have been adopted by the early 1920s for all carriage stock.
Also from the Callington line came the ex LSWR royal saloon whose history has been fully covered elsewhere.
Other Carriages
At
an unspecified date between 1915 and 1919, three carriages arrived and
are shown on the returns for the latter year. Tonks says that all three
were 4w ex North Staffordshire carriages. However the author has only
been able to find photographic or other evidence for 2 composite (3 x
3rd, 1 x 1st) ex NSR carriages Nos 13 and 14 (the 1941 army inventory
shows No 14 as 2 x 3rd, 2 x 1st but this is not supported by photographic
evidence). Certainly two carriages continued in use well into the 1930s
on excursions and they existed at Army takeover.
The third stock addition was probably the ex GER carriage which certainly arrived from the K&ESR in 1916. It was a three compartment Brake 3rd, its K&ESR No 10, which was despatched on 20 November 1916 to become SMR No17. The carriage was built by the Ashbury Railway Carriage and Iron Company to the GER’s diagram 44 in 1870 and it was probably GER No 255. It had been bought by the K&ESR direct from the GER in February 1901. By the time it came to the S&MLR it had already been modified with an inside ‘corridor’ for the guard. Latterly this coach was photographed on its own or with wagons, indicating its possible use as a p/w vehicle, before being finally relegated as a store at Abbey station where it survived as a virtual wreck until 1952.
According to stock returns a further 3rd class carriage arrived in 1923 giving a net increase of 16 seats. An explanation for this might be that Gazelle’s Tramcar trailer (No 16) was added to the returns for the first time; it is highly unlikely that the carriage came into use later than the generally accepted date of 1915/16. During 1925 the 3rd class carriage stock was reduced by one with a net loss of 50 seats. The author is unable to find hard evidence behind this change but as a speculation it is possible that one of the LSWR five compartment carriages was moved to the Weston Clevedon and Portishead as one of these turns up in 1925 as their No 16 and by 1941 only 5 LSWR carriages remained on the S&MLR.
A North London full Brake of the characteristic type for that line was acquired at some date, possibly 1924 and certainly after 1916, and became No18. Unless it is the second passenger brake in the returns mentioned above it seems never to have appeared in the stock returns. There are no known photographs of this van in use and it became a store at Shrewsbury Abbey until broken up in 1952.
The Wagons
The
S&MLR wagons are extraordinarily difficult to describe definitively.
There were initially 32 in the 1911 returns and there were some additions
over the years.Six unspecified wagons were acquired by hire purchase through
the Wagon Finance Corporation in November 1913. Two open wagons disappeared
in the later WW1 period when no stock returns were recorded and two match
trucks in 1920; offset by the acquisition of a handsome horse box in the
same period, three timber trucks in 1924 and three cattle wagons in 1927.
There was however no official reductions in stock even in the 1930s even
though they were beginning to fall to pieces as internal traffic disappeared
and repairs ceased. There were 40 by the time of the WD takeover in February
1941. At that time the inventory listed 1 goods brake van; 6 timber trucks;
8 low sider wagons (plus 2 converted to flats); 9 box vans (plus one stores
van); 6 high sided open wagons; and 7 cattle wagons. The Army appears
to have conducted a review of rolling stock with the SMLR in 1947 and
there was a write-off of stock on 16 April 1947, probably of virtually
all of the carriages and open wagons, but details have now been lost.
At Nationalisation Austen was valuing rolling stock and claimed 1 ‘Luggage
and Parcels van’ (presumably No 2) valued at £7; 17 wagons
at £5 each and 1 crane at £10. 16 of the 17 wagons must have
been the box and cattle wagons used for grain storage at Abbey until 1952
but the other survivor, if it really existed, remains unknown.
The horse box (numbered 15 in the carriage series and also carrying the number 7121) was a unique vehicle for a Stephens line and was of unknown origin. One cannot imagine a regular business in internal movement of thoroughbred or hunting horses on the railway so it must be assumed it was acquired for an unknown purpose but latterly seems to have part of the crane set with two runners. It should be remembered that this set of wagons was not intended for train breakdowns as the unnumbered 4 wheeled crane of unknown origin was a hand operated and wooden jibbed affair with only a 5 ton capacity. It would have been used as a mobile station crane for loading timber etc. and for light bridge and track work. The horse box disappeared during WW2 but the crane survived to be withdrawn on 3 October 1952 and transported to Swindon Works on 20 July 1953 where it seems unlikely to have survived much longer.
So far as can be ascertained from the scarce photographic records the low sided opens and most of the box vans surviving in 1941 were ex Midland Railway although at least two box vans; an unnumbered example, probably that described in official returns as a ‘stores van’ and a body grounded at Llandrinio Road (which might account for the reduction of one van in 1915) show all the characteristics of North Eastern Railway vehicles. This railway was also probably the source of the cattle wagons, although at least one, No 43, was an ex Great Western W2. The high side opens are difficult to trace as good photos are very scarce, but one, No 34, showed the old company markings of the Great Northern through worn paint and was characteristic of that company’s commonest open goods. Three timber wagons ,presumably those acquired in 1924, bore previous owners markings ; two were marked ‘CR’ (the Caledonian Railway) and one ‘LMS’ and two seem to have carried the numbers 41985 and 43420 rather than the numbers 24 and 25 apparently allocated. There is confusion here particularly as the number 24 was already on a Box van.
The
goods brake was of a type only found on the Great Eastern and the London
Tilbury and Southend Railways. No example of the latter’s vans were
recorded as sold off before the Midland Railway takeover in 1911/12 so
and the brake was in use before SMR opening so the balance of probability
must have been an ex GER van.
There was also a dumb buffered ex PS&NWR low sider dated by Perkins as built in1849 that survived to be used by the SMR. Number unknown, it does not seem to appear in the stock returns as such. Tonks records that the remains were broken up in 1936.
There was a grand clear out of wagons and coaches at Abbey station in early 1952 and all existing box and cattle wagons and the remaining three coaches there were towed to Hookagate and scrapped by 3rd July. However 10 box van bodies were reported as grounded for use as huts. Tonks records that six were still in use in 1960 at Edgebold, Horton Lane, Shoot Hill and Kinnerley (3). One or two survived, possibly including earlier groundings, beyond that; i.e. at Llandrinio Road till 1970 and beyond.
To summarise the wagons extant at the time of the army takeover in 1941:
1 to 8 Low sided open
9 and 10 Crane runners converted from low side opens
11 to 14 Unallocated
15 to 24 Box, probably ex MR except possibly 19 a vacant number which
may have been the existing unnumbered ex NER
24 (duplicate) to 26 Bolster Flats ex CR (LMS)
27-29 Unallocated
30 to 33 Cattle wagons ex NER
34 to 39 not allocated but 34 had been an Ex GNR high sided open
40 Goods Brake van ex GER
41 to 42 Cattle wagons ex NER
43 Cattle Wagon ex GWR
44 to 49 High sided open wagons
An unnumbered hand Crane
1 to 3 (Separate series) bolster flats
Wagon livery was probably always Grey with ‘Shropshire and Montgomeryshire Railway’ in full with in plain white lettering. Later the letters S&MR seem only to have been used.
Sources and Acknowledgements
S&MLR Annual Reports and copy of 1941 Inventory
held in Colonel Stephens Railway Archive
Peter Witt
