A Brief History

Adams A12 class 0-4-2 ‘Jubilees’.

These where mixed traffic locomotives with the first engine completed in May 1887, the 50th year Jubilee of the Queen Victoria’s reign.

With a total on ninety being built between 1887 and 1895 at Nine Elms and forty by Nielson & Co Glasgow, making them the largest Adams class of all the British 0-4-2s.

These where based at Nine Elms, Guildford, Basingstoke, Yeovil, Exmouth Junction, Strawberry Hill, Salisbury, Wadebridge and Plymouth, they proved successful and popular.

The most noticeable change was when Drummond chimney where fitted from 1900 onwards to most of the class, although a few still has their original stove pipe chimney into the 1920s.

K10 and L11 4-4-0s took over many of the Jubilees duties but many crews still preferred the Jubilees which were more economical locomotives burning less coal per mile then their successors, they also had a higher yearly mileage.

By the 1920s the Jubilees where seen mainly on branch line work, pick-up goods and shunting duties.

At the 1923 grouping, all ninety Jubilees where still in service and remained until 1928 when the first six being withdrawn and broken up which continued through the following years and became the last serving 0-4-2s on Britain’s railways.

618, 627, 629 & 636 entered into British Railways stock in 1948 but where not renumbered and kept their Southern lettering with 629 being the last one in general service, ending its days shunting at Eastleigh and was withdrawn in November 1948.

There was one other to exist longer in departmental use supplying steam to Eastleigh boiler yard as DS3191 (Ex612) until November 1951.

Unfortunately, none of these good-looking Jubilees made it into preservation.

LSWR/SR ‘0330’ Class (Saddletanks)

These where built by Beyer Peacock and Co from 1867 for the Swedish, Australian, Belgium, London and South Western Railway and several other railways including British Collieries.

A Total of 20 been supplied to the LS&WR between 1876 to 1882 for shunting duties at Nine Elms Dorchester, Exeter Guilford, Basingstoke, Northam, Saulsbury, Portsmouth, Strawberry Hill, Fratton, Eastleigh, Bournemouth and were also seen on engineer’s train including the construction of the Lyme Regis branch.

All entered Southern Railway stock at the grouping and by now some were being re-boilers and only nine received Southern Railway Livery with the last two 0332 and 0334 being withdrawn from Southern in 1933 but ended up remaining derelict at Eastleigh and not being broken up until 1949.

In 1925 Colonel Stephens bough Nº127 which left Eastleigh Works painted light green lettered EKR Nº7 and worked until 1945.

In 1932 0335 went to the K&ESR and was re-numbered No4 until being laid aside in 1946 and was broken up at Ashford in 1948 having spent 72 years in service.

In 1879 an 0-6-0ST was purchased & put to work on the Stratford Upon Avon to Broom Line, it was sold in 1890 to Rothervale Collieries Co in South Yorkshire, (Later NCB.) I believe this was the last example in Britain which was not scraped until 1959 bearing the number 0.

CBSCR / GSR 0-6-0STs

The Cork, Bandon & South Coast Railway (CBSCR) ordered five 0-6-0 saddle tanks from Beyer Peacock. They were derived from a standard Beyer Peacock design, dating from 1867, and similar engines were supplied to Sweden, Belgium, the London & South Western Railway and British collieries. The five CBSCR five locomotives had slightly different driving wheels diameters and hence tractive efforts and after 1925, the GSR placed them in three classes (J21, J23, J24) as the Inchicore classification scheme was based on wheel arrangement (J for 0-6-0s and 0-6-0Ts), with classes numbed in descending order of tractive effort. There were also variations in cab styles and bunkers. As a small non-standard group of engines, they were all withdrawn by 1940. 475 and 472 were retained for boiler washout at Broadstone and Inchicore respectively for some years after withdrawal. In CBSCR days, these engines ran in olive green livery; after 1925 the GSR painted the survivors in its all-over grey livery.

A batch of 40 Drummond K10s were built at Elms works between 1901-1902 for mixed traffic work there they earned the nickname “Small Hoppers.”
These K10s were mainly paired with 6 wheel tenders because of their intended short journeys although some carries the larger 8-wheel water cart tenders.
The K10s underwent little change in their lifetime apart from “Urie” removing the firebox water tube box during LSWR days. In 1925 ten of the Drummond K10s were fitted with stove-pipe chimneys for use on the Easters section, being based at Gillingham from 1940. They began to lose their smoke-box wing plates. During 1941 five of the K10 class were lent to the LMS and worked mainly from Bristol and Gloucester and in the SDJR.
The main withdraw started at the end of Southern days in 1947, 31 entered British Railway stock at nationalisation when withdrawal was so rapid. Only 30382 received BR numbering whilst 389 was the last to be withdrawn in July of 1951 from Yeovil town shed. None where preserved.

Irish Ex GS&WR 101 (J15) class 0-6-0

THE Great Southern and Western Railways 101 class was Ireland’s largest steam locomotive class with 119 members (never more than 111 locomotives existed at one time - as older locomotives were scrapped, a new one took its number!).
Originally designed at Beyer Peacock, the first started work in 1867, although the GSWR’s Engineer, Alexander McDonnell had rebuilt an earlier 0-4-2 to an 0-6-0 (doubtless having the use of BP’s drawings for the planned engines) and in time this locomotive became a standard member of the class.
Although ten were produced by Beyer Peacock and eight by Sharp Stewart, the vast majority were built by the GS&W in their Inchicore works, in Dublin, Ireland, with the final loco being rolled out in 1903.
The later Great Southern Railways classified them as Class J15, a designation commonly used in CIE days.
There were many changes, great and small, made over the years. With the exception of eight locos (all rebuilds of one form or another) which were withdrawn in the late 19th century, in time all received new round top firebox 4’4” boilers, some of these locomotives (like the preserved No.184) retained this saturated steam boiler until scrapping. Beginning in 1930, about half of the class received a later superheated “Z” Class boiler with Belpaire firebox – the preserved No.186 was one of these.
The original locomotives had typical BP features including a sloping front to the smokebox, fitted with double smoke box doors, these being replaced with a single vertical door in the course of rebuilding.
In later years most superheated locomotives ran with larger tenders while the saturated locomotives mainly kept the smaller tenders with springs to the upper sides of the tank sides, however there were several other types of tenders used as well.
Almost 60 remained in service into the 1960s, of which, about a dozen still had round top fireboxed saturated boliers.
The last of the class was withdrawn in the mid 1960s. Thankfully, one of each main type has been preserved: No 184 representing the earlier round top boiler and smaller upper sprung tender, the other being No 186 with a super- heated (Belpaire firebox) Z boiler and a larger tender.