Bulleid Spam Cans

The Bulleid Light Pacific locomotives were introduced in 1945 by the Southern Railway to a design by Oliver Bulleid. They were designed as a smaller version of the Merchant Navy Class. Their 18 ton axle loading and 8 foot 6 inch wide cabs enabled the class to be used almost anywhere on the Southern Region. Later members, 34071 onwards, were built with wider 9 foot cabs. These locomotives were attached to wider 5,500 gallon tenders. They were often referred to as 'Spam-Cans' because of their unconventional streamlined appearance.

They incorporated the same novel features as the Merchant Navy Class including an all-steel welded boiler, chain-driven valve-gear, inside motion enclosed in an oil bath and 'air-smoothed' casing.

All of this engineering detail meant nothing to me as a kid when I would spend hours during summer school holidays in the 50s train-spotting on the Southern mainline that ran from Victoria to Dover. My favoured location was just downline from Teynham station, which provided good views over a considerable length of the track. The most memorable times were to see a Bulleid Light Pacific from the 'West Country' or 'Battle of Britain' class emblazoned with golden arrows to casing sides and one angled on the front of the boiler housing as it thundered by hauling the Golden Arrow express - suitably named the Flèche D'Or on the run from Calais to Paris. Young heads were filled with romantic ideas of travelling to Paris in one of the Pullman carriages that formed the train....

Battle of Britain class No. 34072 '257 Squadron'

Many years later in October 2003 I attended a steam festival at The Bluebell Line in Sussex. This big kid at heart was thrilled to enjoy a train journey steam hauled by West Country Pacific no. 21C123 'Blackmore Vale' double-headed with visiting LNER V2 2-6-2 no. 60800 'Green Arrow'.

'Green Arrow'

The sheer grace of these magnificent locomotives from a bygone era is breathtaking and fortunately many of them have been preserved by Heritage Lines throughout the UK. I look forward to the day when I can enjoy one of the excursions that run on mainline routes and experience the thrill of being steam hauled at speed....

Memories of Childhood

I was born in Teynham, a small village in Kent, at 2:00am on 9th May 1945. Victory in Europe celebrations were in full swing as my mother gave birth to me in the back bedroom of a terraced house where the occupants had witnessed, first hand, the Battle of Britain. Dogfights between the RAF and the German Luftwaffe were everyday occurrences in 1940 and my mother recounted tales of fierce battles that were watched overhead in this corner of Southeast England. The Luftwaffe often jettisoned bombs overhead and one fell close and destroyed a church not 100 metres from where I was born...

My father joined the army in 1939, the Cheshire Regiment, an infantry brigade heavily armed with machine guns. 24 hours before mobilisation for North Africa and ultimately the Al Alamein campaign his commanding officer seconded my dad to the Royal Engineers, as it became news that he could drive steam locomotives. Ultimately he drove ammunition trains for the Western Front campaign.

His love for these magnificent locomotives began when he served an apprenticeship in Crewe locomotive works and his love rubbed off on me. From the age of six I lived with my parents in Rugby, Warwickshire, a focal point for the LMS railway (London, Midland, Scottish). Inevitably, I became a 'trainspotter' and from the age of around nine would spend hours at the embankment south of Rugby station and record all the locomotives seen.

I spent my school holidays at the place of my birth - Teynham - with my maternal grandparents. And my love of steam locos came with me. I would encamp at Teynham railway station and see the 'Golden Arrow' express thunder through the station, hauled by a King Arthur class, or Schools class, or, on special days, a West Country or Battle of Britain class Bulleid Pacific locomotive, with a golden arrow emblazoned to the front smoke-box and on the boiler sides.

This love of steam has carried me through many years and into railway modelling. And the Southern region is no better represented than by the 'School' class 4-4-0s, represented here by "DOVER" a locomotive that I saw as a child and the Hornby model of which has just been added to my collection.

The age of steam is now a distant memory, a memory of my childhood, but an era that still reminds me of days of innocence and fulfilment. Days spent with mates and Ian Allen record books, a notebook and pencil, a bag of sandwiches and a bottle of dandelion & burdock pop, and above all, a sense of adventure and anticipation as those steam locomotives thundered through....