NINETEEN SIXTY TWO – PART 100
Welsh Holiday September 1962
Michael L. Roach
When I was much younger I made several longer distance trips chasing and photographing trains when I stayed away for a few nights in bed and breakfast; however I only took three such holidays which lasted a complete week. The third holiday was to the north-east of England in September 1975 for the 150th anniversary celebrations of the opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway and I returned home an enthusiast for all things north-east and North Eastern Railway. The second holiday was to Mid and North Wales in the summer of 1969 to visit all the narrow-gauge railways. The first complete week's holiday was to Wales and the four lines out of Brecon in September 1962. This was after the TUCC Hearing which had recommended closure of all four lines and it was just a matter of weeks or a couple of months at the most before the closures would be implemented. In a way it was a very sad and melancholy time knowing that this would be the last time that I would see these fascinating lines, trains and stations set in beautiful countryside because this would be my last visit before closure; and that hundreds of railwaymen would lose their jobs with the withdrawal of passenger and freight trains and lifting of most of the track. The passenger routes to be closed were:
Route Mileage
Brecon – Three Cocks Junction – Moat Lane Junction 60
Brecon - Three Cocks Junction – Hereford 38½
Brecon – Newport 47
Brecon – Neath 33¼
TOTAL route mileage 178¾
The date chosen for the holiday was the first week in September 1962 which was quite fortuitous as the children had returned to school for the autumn term and some would be seen using the train to and from secondary school in Brecon. I invited my friend Charles Fennamore to accompany me but work and study commitments prevented him doing so. It was a bit difficult to decide whether to press on alone with the holiday but I decided that this was really my last chance to do the four lines in a comprehensive fashion so alone it would have to be. The intention behind the holiday was to go by car to take photos in the countryside but to make at least one return journey by train on each route out of Brecon. The plan was to start at Newport Station and head north by car stopping at every station and halt along the line through to Brecon and then on to Moat Lane Junction on the line from Whitchurch to Aberystwyth. That was over 100 miles and 45 stations, and if there was time I would also go west from Brecon down the line to Neath and east from Three Cocks Junction to Hereford as far as possible. I knew from the outset that it was a tall order and so it proved; I got as far west as Cray on the line to Neath but did none of the stations on the former LMS route to Hereford.
I journeyed up from my home in Plymouth to Newport on Saturday 1 September 1962 and the trip was horrendous with traffic jams and slow moving traffic in many places. In the late 1950s and 1960s summer Saturdays were notorious for traffic jams and journeys taking more than twice as long as usual. There were almost no dual carriageways and few bypasses on the A38 with the road passing through many towns and villages. This was the last Saturday of the school holidays and the last Saturday of the peak season. I left home in Plymouth at 09.25 and ran into the first jams at Haldon, before Exeter, then at Exeter, near Tiverton, Wellington, Taunton, Bridgwater and Highbridge. I arrived at the Aust ferry queue north of Bristol at 16.30 It was always a conundrum travelling in this direction whether to go to Aust and see the length of the queue waiting for the ferry across the River Severn because it was a long way off the A38 direct route if going around Gloucester which itself added many miles to the journey. The main road went right through the centre of Gloucester which could add more traffic jams to the trip. Travelling in the opposite direction from Wales to the West Country was easier because the ferry was only two miles off the A48 from Chepstow to Gloucester. After gradually moving up the queue and waiting well over two hours to get on the boat I finally drove off the ferry and up the slipway at Beachley at 19.15 and through Chepstow. The ferry fare for a small car and driver was 7 shillings and 6 pence (37½p). At the time petrol was 5 shillings (25p) a gallon and the car only did about 30 miles to the gallon so there was not much difference in the cost of going round the long way and the ferry fare. The advantage of taking the ferry was that it gave the single driver a break and it was a real experience to cross the River Severn by boat which would cease with the opening of the Severn Bridge in 1966. Needless to say the ferry did not run in the dark or in rough seas.
I stopped twice in Chepstow in different places to photograph Brunel's famous bridge across the River Wye which was being rebuilt at the time. My arrival in Newport was at 20.40 and I found bed and breakfast at 39 Corporation Road, Newport NP19 0AY. It had taken 11¼ hours to cover 172 miles from Plymouth to Newport. Luckily the car had not overheated (a common problem in those days) and I always took plenty of reading matter with me to read while waiting for trains. The car was a maroon 1939 Morris 8 Series E registration FKB 972 and not very reliable, but I only had one incident in the whole holiday that has stayed in the memory when I had to brake heavily on a narrow road. I had been watching “Bangers and Cash” on Yesterday TV Channel for a couple of years when during the writing of this article I saw the first Series E Morris 8 go through the Mathewsons auction in Thornton-le-Dale. It had the registration FAF 785 which means the car was first registered in Cornwall in 1939. The car had been resprayed in non-standard colours, looked immaculate, and fetched an amazing £4,300.
Before setting out on the holiday I had decided that everything that could be recorded about the holiday and the railways seen would be recorded, including engine numbers, coach numbers, train logs, expenditure, times of arrival/departure, photos taken and a couple of lines about each station visited; and sometimes a sketch of the station and track layout. The first expenditure even before leaving was a new notebook (cost 9d) to do the recording. It was wire-bound with a page size of 6 inches by 4 inches to fit in the pocket. On returning to the guest house each evening completed pages were torn out of the notebook and left in my luggage to ensure that even if the notebook was dropped or lost not all the information noted would be lost. In the autumn of 1962 the loose pages were put in a distinctive second-hand cardboard box for safe keeping and they are still there 60 years later and the notes do make it much easier to write articles about this 1962 holiday.
There were many interesting railway stations on the rail routes out of Brecon but four of the best were on the former Brecon & Merthyr line heading south over the Brecon Beacons. Just in the first 17 miles were Talylllyn Junction, Pentir Rhiw, Torpantau and Pontsticill Junction. We are lucky in Cornwall that, more than 60 years later, we still have two rural stations that bear comparison for interest and they are the junction stations at Liskeard and St. Erth which in 2024 retain a mechanical signal box, semaphore signals and a range of older buildings. A few of the photos taken on that 1962 holiday have appeared in this series already in Parts 83, 86 and 87. Those seven days in Wales in September 1962 were almost certainly the best, most memorable, and most productive (in terms of photos and memories) of any railway holiday I ever had. This may be the last you will see or read about it. Accompanying this article are the photos taken on the evening of Saturday 1 September 1962 of the rebuilding of Brunel's famous bridge across the River Wye at Chepstow.
Authors Note: This is the last in a series of 100 articles, mostly about 1962, posted over the last 18 months. My thanks go to the CRS webmasters past and present for publishing the articles including some on quite esoteric subjects only vaguely related to railways. A new series of articles will commence soon.
Route Mileage
Brecon – Three Cocks Junction – Moat Lane Junction 60
Brecon - Three Cocks Junction – Hereford 38½
Brecon – Newport 47
Brecon – Neath 33¼
TOTAL route mileage 178¾
The date chosen for the holiday was the first week in September 1962 which was quite fortuitous as the children had returned to school for the autumn term and some would be seen using the train to and from secondary school in Brecon. I invited my friend Charles Fennamore to accompany me but work and study commitments prevented him doing so. It was a bit difficult to decide whether to press on alone with the holiday but I decided that this was really my last chance to do the four lines in a comprehensive fashion so alone it would have to be. The intention behind the holiday was to go by car to take photos in the countryside but to make at least one return journey by train on each route out of Brecon. The plan was to start at Newport Station and head north by car stopping at every station and halt along the line through to Brecon and then on to Moat Lane Junction on the line from Whitchurch to Aberystwyth. That was over 100 miles and 45 stations, and if there was time I would also go west from Brecon down the line to Neath and east from Three Cocks Junction to Hereford as far as possible. I knew from the outset that it was a tall order and so it proved; I got as far west as Cray on the line to Neath but did none of the stations on the former LMS route to Hereford.
I journeyed up from my home in Plymouth to Newport on Saturday 1 September 1962 and the trip was horrendous with traffic jams and slow moving traffic in many places. In the late 1950s and 1960s summer Saturdays were notorious for traffic jams and journeys taking more than twice as long as usual. There were almost no dual carriageways and few bypasses on the A38 with the road passing through many towns and villages. This was the last Saturday of the school holidays and the last Saturday of the peak season. I left home in Plymouth at 09.25 and ran into the first jams at Haldon, before Exeter, then at Exeter, near Tiverton, Wellington, Taunton, Bridgwater and Highbridge. I arrived at the Aust ferry queue north of Bristol at 16.30 It was always a conundrum travelling in this direction whether to go to Aust and see the length of the queue waiting for the ferry across the River Severn because it was a long way off the A38 direct route if going around Gloucester which itself added many miles to the journey. The main road went right through the centre of Gloucester which could add more traffic jams to the trip. Travelling in the opposite direction from Wales to the West Country was easier because the ferry was only two miles off the A48 from Chepstow to Gloucester. After gradually moving up the queue and waiting well over two hours to get on the boat I finally drove off the ferry and up the slipway at Beachley at 19.15 and through Chepstow. The ferry fare for a small car and driver was 7 shillings and 6 pence (37½p). At the time petrol was 5 shillings (25p) a gallon and the car only did about 30 miles to the gallon so there was not much difference in the cost of going round the long way and the ferry fare. The advantage of taking the ferry was that it gave the single driver a break and it was a real experience to cross the River Severn by boat which would cease with the opening of the Severn Bridge in 1966. Needless to say the ferry did not run in the dark or in rough seas.
I stopped twice in Chepstow in different places to photograph Brunel's famous bridge across the River Wye which was being rebuilt at the time. My arrival in Newport was at 20.40 and I found bed and breakfast at 39 Corporation Road, Newport NP19 0AY. It had taken 11¼ hours to cover 172 miles from Plymouth to Newport. Luckily the car had not overheated (a common problem in those days) and I always took plenty of reading matter with me to read while waiting for trains. The car was a maroon 1939 Morris 8 Series E registration FKB 972 and not very reliable, but I only had one incident in the whole holiday that has stayed in the memory when I had to brake heavily on a narrow road. I had been watching “Bangers and Cash” on Yesterday TV Channel for a couple of years when during the writing of this article I saw the first Series E Morris 8 go through the Mathewsons auction in Thornton-le-Dale. It had the registration FAF 785 which means the car was first registered in Cornwall in 1939. The car had been resprayed in non-standard colours, looked immaculate, and fetched an amazing £4,300.
Before setting out on the holiday I had decided that everything that could be recorded about the holiday and the railways seen would be recorded, including engine numbers, coach numbers, train logs, expenditure, times of arrival/departure, photos taken and a couple of lines about each station visited; and sometimes a sketch of the station and track layout. The first expenditure even before leaving was a new notebook (cost 9d) to do the recording. It was wire-bound with a page size of 6 inches by 4 inches to fit in the pocket. On returning to the guest house each evening completed pages were torn out of the notebook and left in my luggage to ensure that even if the notebook was dropped or lost not all the information noted would be lost. In the autumn of 1962 the loose pages were put in a distinctive second-hand cardboard box for safe keeping and they are still there 60 years later and the notes do make it much easier to write articles about this 1962 holiday.
There were many interesting railway stations on the rail routes out of Brecon but four of the best were on the former Brecon & Merthyr line heading south over the Brecon Beacons. Just in the first 17 miles were Talylllyn Junction, Pentir Rhiw, Torpantau and Pontsticill Junction. We are lucky in Cornwall that, more than 60 years later, we still have two rural stations that bear comparison for interest and they are the junction stations at Liskeard and St. Erth which in 2024 retain a mechanical signal box, semaphore signals and a range of older buildings. A few of the photos taken on that 1962 holiday have appeared in this series already in Parts 83, 86 and 87. Those seven days in Wales in September 1962 were almost certainly the best, most memorable, and most productive (in terms of photos and memories) of any railway holiday I ever had. This may be the last you will see or read about it. Accompanying this article are the photos taken on the evening of Saturday 1 September 1962 of the rebuilding of Brunel's famous bridge across the River Wye at Chepstow.
Authors Note: This is the last in a series of 100 articles, mostly about 1962, posted over the last 18 months. My thanks go to the CRS webmasters past and present for publishing the articles including some on quite esoteric subjects only vaguely related to railways. A new series of articles will commence soon.
In this view I am looking west from the bridge carrying Beachley Road, Chepstow over the railway line on the evening of 1 September 1962. The down line is in use by trains in both directions while the bridge carrying the up line has been replaced but not yet brought into use because parts of Brunel's bridge were still being removed. Copyright Michael L. Roach.
Ten minutes later I am looking at the old and new railway bridges from beside the River Wye in the middle of Chepstow. This view of the railway bridge has now been blocked out by the road bridge carrying the A48 road over the river. The nearest car is a very desirable Wolseley 1500 (although the Riley 1500 was very similar) while the far one is the ubiquitous minivan. Copyright Michael L. Roach.
Many thanks to you Michael, on behalf of the CRS and all our readers who I am sure have greatly enjoyed the '1962' series. We look forwards to seeing what comes next.
For all of Michaels articles, please click here.
For all of Michaels articles, please click here.
Newquay developments - 17.08.24
Roger Winnen
240817a The buffer stops at Newquay Station today. Soon there will be an additional platform here. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817b Platform 1 has been trackless for many years. Extenions to this platform can be seen making it the longest platform in Cornwall. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817c Looking back at the redundant platform together with Newquay Police Station and a former railway building which is in for the chop. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817d Looking towards Quintrell Downs showing sections of the platform missing. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817e This is the limit for passengers on Newquay's platform today. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817f A Class 150 arrives at Newquay on the 12.20 Par to Newquay service. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817g Entering the overgrown platform at Newquay. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817i Departure from Newquay as the train passes the old railway building. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817j Hardcore laid in preparation for the second platform. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817k Demolition of the former railway building. Copyright Roger Winnen
240817l The former railway buildiing adjacent to the old Platform 1. Copyright Roger Winnen
'Down South'
Roger Geach
Its a long time ago I was last here, the trees have grown. 70010 is seen on 4O14 0639 crewe to Southampton liner on Thur 15 8 2024. Copyright Roger Geach.
A different angle but 47281 passing the same spot with 205026 also in frame, 1986. Copyright Roger Geach.
70016 on 4M61 the 1256 Southampton - Trafford Park liner on Thur 15 8 2024. Copyright Roger Geach.
59004 powers away from eastleigh station with 6O68 0911 westbury to Crawley service 14.08.2024, copyright Roger Geach.
70010 4O14 0639 Crewe - Southampton approaching Eastleigh. 14.08.2024, copyright Roger Geach.
The new Beacon Rail shunter now working for Gb Railfreight shunting box wagons. Copyright Roger Geach.
Many thanks Roger - more to come from this area from Roger over the next couple of days.
The end of 1976
By Roger Winnen
Part 6
29.12.1976 - Carbis Wharf near Bugle. Copyright Roger Winnen
29.12.1976 - China Clay dries at Greensplatt near Trenance Junction St Austell once had a signal box to control the sidings. Copyright Roger Winnen
29.12.1976 - A Class 50 with the 09.30 Paddington Penzance service passes the closed dries. Copyright Roger Winnen
31.12.1976 - D1048 Western Lady approaching Doublebois Copyright Roger Winnen
This instalment concludes Rogers 'end of 1976' series, we hope you've enjoyed the photos.
Swindon Shots
Ken Mumford
60049 'Ben Nevis' [a long way from the Fort William area!!] stops briefly in platform 1 with 6Z.52 [Tytherington to Willesden] from Left Tytherington 74 EARLY! BUT left Bristol Parkway at 1301 - ! EARLY!! Due Swindon 14 35 to 14 43 - actual 1436 to 1438 - roughly 4 EARLY and reached its destination 40 EARLY!! Copyright Ken Mumford.
800312 [5A48 Bristol (Temple Meads) to Paddington ECS running in the path of the cancelled 1A48 - Bristol (Temple Meads) to Paddington on the UML (Up Main Line] running 3 EARLY overtakes (in platform 3) a Paddington bound IET - this was [I worked out from RTT] was 1A25 [Paignton to Paddington] which was running late with IET unit 802103 and left Swindon 17 LATE. Copyright Ken Mumford.
387166 & 387164 [1U20 - Paddington to Bristol Parkway] with station departure staff acknowledging driver in first photo. Copyright Ken Mumford.
Many thanks to you, Ken