Swanage Railway News Gallery - Page 20Tribute to the late Trevor Heard, Drummond Locomotives Ltd, June 1998NEWS RELEASE From: Swanage Railway DATE: June 23rd 1998.Drummond Locomotives Ltd volunteers are mourning the death of Trevor Heard, one of the major driving forces behind the historic £100,000 project to repatriate Victorian-designed M7 No. 30053 back to Britain and restore it to full working order. The photograph shows Trevor Heard with his beloved M7 No. 30053 on Saturday June 6th 1992 on its first run on the Swanage Railway since May 1964, when based at Bournemouth and in BR ownership.  In tribute, Victorian-designed M7 No. 30053 has carried a poignant wreath on its smokebox door for a man instrumental in planning and achieving the dream of its repatriation back to Britain and restoration to full working order after 20 years in the United States. Colleagues and friends of Trevor Heard - long-time volunteer treasurer and fundraiser with the Southern Repatriation group, the Drummond Locomotive Society and finally Drummond Locomotives Ltd - are in mourning for a man described as "a smashing and sincere guy, a true gentleman and a South Western man through and through” One of the driving forces behind the repatriation back to Britain and restoration to full working order of M7 No. 30053 across more than ten years, Trevor of Newdigate near Dorking in Surrey lost his battle against cancer on Monday, June 15th, 1998. The 59 year old had been receiving radiotherapy for a brain tumour and died just before his last course of treatment. Attended by some 100 people, the funeral of the computer system designer, engineer and keen railway modeller - who worked on the hi-tech Eurostar trains at Acton in north London - took place in Leatherhead on Monday, June 22nd, 1998. He leaves a wife. Lesley, and two grown-up daughters. "It’s tragic - I’m shattered. Trevor was a gentle, kind soul - one of life’s gentlemen who would go out of his way to do anything for anybody. To say he’ll be missed is an understatement. He was a king pin in the restoration of No. 30053," said long-time friend and ex-Southern Repatriation and Drummond Locomotive Society chairman Colin Hebbes of Ashford, Kent. Trevor came to the first meeting of the Southern Repatriation group in Brighton during 1980. Its aim was to return LSWR M7 No. 30053 and Southern Railway Schools class 'Repton' to Britain from the Steamtown Museum then in Vermont and later Scranton, Pennsylvania. Acting as treasurer and fundraiser, Trevor was a key part in the return of M7 No. 30053 to Britain in 1987 and its restoration to full working order at Swindon and the East Anglian Railway Museum for a working retirement on the Swanage Railway’s relaid Purbeck Line to Corfe Castle and Norden. A keen railwayman whose roots were in the west country, Trevor had an extensive Gauge 1 steam railway in his garden. He was an expert on the M7s and other LSWR steam locomotives, inspired by his West Country background among the dying vestiges of the London &South Western Railway. "Trevor’s contribution to No. 30053 was colossal, not only putting money into the project but giving so much of his time. He spent almost every weekend working on the restoration of the M7 at Swindon and then Chappel and Wakes Colne," explained Colin. "His death leaves a considerable hole in Drummond Locomotives Ltd. Whoever is going to fill that hole has a big job on their hands. It won’t be the same to see No. 30053 without Trevor - his smile, friendship, help, knowledge and technical expertise." "No. 30053 is a working and lasting memorial to Trevor. There is no better. He loved that engine and liked nothing more than to watch it hauling trains for its living. Trevor may be gone from us but he’s on that footplate in spirit I’m sure." "He was a king pin and key player all the way through - from Southern Repatriation in the early 1980s to Drummond Locomotives Ltd in the late 1990s. If there had been a few more Trevor Heards about, perhaps No. 30053’s repatriation and restoration might have gone through a bit easier than it did," added Colin. As well as running on the Swanage Railway, M7 No. 30053 has also hauled trains on other preserved railways, as well as the main line out of London Waterloo, in Surrey as well as Hampshire, Dorset, Wiltshire and Somerset. On Monday, June 22nd, 1998 - the day of Trevor’s funeral in Leatherhead - M7 No. 30053 ran the Swanage Railway’s train service to Corfe Castle and Norden. On its smokebox door was hung a poignant wreath in memory of the man who did so much to make that scene become a reality.
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