SO MANY FIRSTS AMONG DIESELS!
SWANAGE RAILWAY'S 2007 DIESEL GALA & BEER FESTIVAL
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News Item and Photo Report from Andrew P.M. Wright - dated 15th May 2007
Official photographer & press officer, Swanage Railway.
Photographs are copyright Andrew P.M. Wright.
To view a larger version of any photograph on this page, just click on the thumbnail photograph and subsequently use the Back button on your browser to return to this page.

Andrew P.M. Wright has supplied over 230 superb photos of services during the Swanage Railway's Diesel Gala and Beer Festival held on 11th, 12th & 13th May 2007. We have split the photos over several pages. Please follow the links at the foot of this page for more photos.

Andrew P.M. Wright writes:
The Swanage Railway’s largest ever diesel gala and beer festival was an amazing and historic weekend that saw several important firsts take place – and four exciting and historic days that I would certainly not have missed.

Even the dark clouds and rain on the Friday afternoon and the Sunday morning failed to dampen anyone’s spirits while sunshine on the Friday morning, throughout the Saturday and during Sunday afternoon proved that the Isle of Purbeck does have its own micro-climate.

There were several firsts that took place prior to and during the event. There was the first train to run to Swanage via a permanent connection since the summer of 1972 on the Thursday afternoon, the first push-pull operated main line train to run to Swanage since the summer of 1971 and the first Class 47 diesel locomotive to run to Swanage since the late summer of 1966.

But, the event also saw more history take place – the first Class 73 electro-diesel to run to Swanage since 1968 and the first ever Western Region diesel-hydraulic to run down to Swanage.

Running through from the start of Friday, 11th May, to the end of Sunday, 13th May, 2007, the diesel weekend and beer festival was the culmination of the Swanage Railway’s achievements to date. But, there is so much more to achieve.

The first ever movement of locomotives using the Swanage Railway’s new permanent connection at Motala, between Furzebrook and Norden, happened under leaden grey skies – and in pouring rain – around 5.30pm on Thursday, 10th May, 2007. (For a full photo report on that historic event, please click here.)

The last time that the Swanage branch was permanently connected to the main line railway system was back in 1972, the year of the horrific massacre at the Munich Olympics in Germany and the year that saw the first commercially available digital watch and pocket calculator.

What do you remember about 1972? The heady music of Marc Bolan’s T-Rex or the bitter miners’ strike against Conservative Prime Minister Ted Heath? For anyone involved with the Swanage Railway – or the Swanage branch before it – 1972 means just one thing; the controversial end of the line that had opened back in 1885.

Coming in from the main line for the diesel gala and beer festival were four ex-BR diesel locomotives and a preserved four-coach VEP electric unit No. 3417 – named after former BR Southern Region General Manager Gordon Pettitt – kindly provided by South West Trains.

The four locomotives were BR Class 52 No. D1015 ‘Western Champion’ owned by the Diesel Traction Group and based on the Severn Valley Railway; two BR Class 73s – No. 73 136 owned by the Class 73 Locomotive Preservation Group and No. 73 208 owned and operated by GB Railfreight – as well as BR Class 47 No. 47 635 owned by Seco Rail.

Two of the Swanage Railway’s resident diesel locomotives – ex-BR Class 33 ‘Stan Symes’ No. D6515 owned by the 71A Locomotive Group and ex-BR Class 20 No. D8188 owned by the Somerset and Dorset Locomotive Group Ltd – also hauled some of the trains.

As well as a operating a 40 minute train service between Swanage, Herston, Harman’s Cross, Corfe Castle and Norden park and ride, the visiting and resident diesel locomotives also operated an intensive shuttle service between Norden and Harman’s Cross – the stock being formed of the four-coach electric VEP unit kindly supplied by South West Trains.

For those who could not do without steam traction during the special event, ex-BR Standard Class 4 Tank No. 80078, built at Brighton in 1954, hauled four trains from Swanage to Norden each day. No. 80078 was the first ex-BR steam locomotive to arrive at Swanage in September, 1976, after being rescued from the Barry scrapyard in south Wales.

The diesel gala and beer festival was three days of nostalgia and memories with those people took young to remember experiencing the excitement of discovery for the first time. Of course, there was also beer in a marquee next to Harman’s Cross station.

But, among the enjoyment of the weekend – and the admiration for what had been achieved over so many years so that the event could happen – there was a tinge of sadness for those many Swanage Railway supporters and active volunteers who have not lived long enough to see this weekend.

As I waited on the ruins of the Corfe Castle for the distinctive sound of the English Electric diesel-electric engine of a Class 73 to carry on the wind as it climbed up from Harman’s Cross to Corfe Castle, just some of those names came to mind – Hilda Wright, Don and Dorothy Gosling, Ernest and Jill Rutland as well as John Clothier and Stan Crook who started the fledgling locomotive department at Swanage,

For those who remember the Swanage branch during BR days and rode on it after the end of timetabled steam traction in September, 1966, the sound of the two Class 73s running between Swanage and Norden brought back memories of the three-coach ‘Hampshire’ class diesel electric multiple units, known as DEMUs for short, that provided the train service from 1966 until the end on Saturday, January 1st, 1972.

But, as well as the Swanage Railway supporters who have not lived to see their dream become a reality – a train running from the main line down to Swanage via a permanent connection – there are the former BR staff who worked on the Swanage branch line who have not lived to see the clock turned back.

Just some of those names came to mind – Swanage signalman Arthur Galton, the chirpy former Swanage station porter Bill ‘Taffy’ Hazell who saw off the last BR train away from Swanage late on the night of Saturday, 1st January, 1972, and his fellow porter at the terminal station, George Sims.

Then there was Jack Cannons, who was station foreman at Swanage from 1963 to 1969, and lived in the station house at Corfe Castle after it lost its stationmaster in 1966. Jack was still living there in the mid-1970s as the abandoned Victorian station fell victim to decay and the ravages of time and nature.

Former Swanage branch drivers also come to mind – Jack Spicer, Jock Habgood, Fred Norman and Johnny Walker who drove the last train from Swanage in 1972. Living next to the line by Victoria Avenue on the outskirts of Swanage, Fred died a few years ago. Johnny Walker, who retired from BR in March, 1972, visited the Swanage Railway in the late 1980s and died in 2003.

But, several former members of Swanage branch staff were able to watch history in the making and see the wrong of 1972 righted – Jimmy Hunt and Bob Inman who were signalmen at Swanage and Corfe Castle, as well as Bryan Green, booking clerk at Swanage, and Swanage porter/shunter Bob Richards.

Bob started as a porter at Corfe Castle station in 1962 – later moving to Swanage as a porter/shunter before returning to Corfe Castle as a porter/signalman and then finally as a signalman there; signalling out that last BR train from Corfe Castle on the night of Saturday 1st January, 1972. Bob is now a signalman at Wareham station, to which he moved on Monday 3rd January, 1972.

The appearance of BR Class 47 No. 47 635, built in 1964, was the first Class 47 to be seen at Swanage since the end of the summer of 1966. The Class 47s ran down to Corfe Castle and Swanage during the summers of 1965 and 1966 when they hauled the Sundays only Eastleigh to Swanage trains whose haulage was shared with a Class 4MT 4-6-0 tender steam locomotive.

The visit of the two Class 73 electro-diesels was the first time since 1968 that a Class 73 had run down to Corfe Castle and Swanage. Built for work on the electrified Bournemouth to London line from July, 1967, the locomotives were based at Bournemouth and could operate ‘off the juice’. They visited the Swanage branch during 1967 and 1968 hauling permanent way trains and also double-heading some Swanage to London through trains which were axed in October, 1969.

The appearance of the four-coach VEP electric unit No. 3417 was the first time that an ex-BR push-pull train had run through Corfe Castle since 1971 – the last summer of a working Swanage branch – when long ramblers’ specials ran down to Swanage.

After the closure of the signal box at Swanage in June, 1967 – and the removal of run-round facilities – London trains were composed of 3TC and 4TC stock that had been converted from 1950s-built Mark One carriages for the Bournemouth electrification scheme. These through London trains ran between July, 1967, and October, 1969, and were mostly hauled by Class 33 diesel locomotives.

After the end of through London trains in October, 1969 – when passengers from the main line had to change trains at Wareham – the only through workings were excursion trains from the Thames Valley made up of Western region DMU stock as well as special ramblers’ trains hauled by Class 33 diesel locomotives and made up to 4TC sets – some being double-headed on the Wareham end and made up of four 4TC sets; quite a sight.

As part of the regular shuttle service between Norden and Harman’s Cross, the VEP was pushed to Harman’s Cross and pulled in the return direction by the Class 73s. The VEP was also conventionally hauled on the shuttle service by the Class 47, the Class 52 ‘Western Champion’ and also the Swanage Railway’s Class 33 D6515 ‘Stan Symes’.

Watching the trains run up and down, it was interesting to recall the early days of the Swanage Railway almost 30 years ago when a busy preserved line carrying more than 200,000 people a year, a connection with the national railway system and four diesel locomotives running off the main line down to Swanage were a world away.

When I first travelled on the Swanage Railway as a 15 year old in 1980, the train service only ran from under the canopy at Swanage station – the platform had yet to be re-instated – and for a few hundred yards to past the engine shed and stream bridge. The locomotive was a mid-1950s oil burning 0-4-0 locomotive called ‘Richard Trevithick’ that had been rescued from a power station while the carriage stock was a Mark One buffet coach and late 1940s Bournemouth line Bulleid coach No. 4365. The price of a train journey then was 30 pence and I still have the ticket somewhere.

Becoming a member of the railway in 1982, I used to cycle from my home near Blandford down to Swanage where I was a volunteer in the signal and telegraph (S&T) department. In April 1984, the train service was extended to the one mile mark at Herston, where a small halt was built, and the trains of between three and four coaches were still hauled by ex-industrial steam locomotives.

One dull summer’s day in July, 1987, was a red letter day when the train service was extended more than half a mile from Herston towards New Barn and a point that became known as Pole 44, the number of a telegraph pole that marked the end of the operating line. From July, 1987, the trains were hauled to Herston where the locomotive ran round its train and then pushed it up to Pole 44.

The first public train to Harman’s Cross – three miles from Swanage – ran in March, 1989, and the station was officially opened by the then General Manager of British Rail’s Southern Region, Gordon Pettitt. It was the first wholly new station to be built in Dorset for more than 50 years and because of the distance and gradients – 1 in 78 and 1 in 76 – ex-industrial steam locomotives were no longer used, ex-BR steam locomotives being used instead.

Just over six years later, on 12th August, 1995, the first train ran from Swanage to Corfe Castle and Norden. It really was the Glorious Twelfth! It was in the summer of 1999 that the tracks of the Swanage Railway crossed the access road that lead to the Norden park and ride car park and BP’s Wytch Farm oil field.

The line was steadily relaid past the former Eldon’s clay sidings, over the clay tramway Bridge No. 13 and on under the A351 Catseye bridge. It was on 3rd January, 2002, exactly 30 years since the line to Corfe Castle and Swanage closed, that the relaid track of the Swanage Railway met the Network Rail stopblock at Motala.

That stopblock had been set up in early September, 1972, after the seven miles of track from Swanage had been lifted in less than eight weeks. It was in June, 2006, that the stopblock was craned out and replaced with a panel of track – two catchpoints, a ground frame, a metal gate and a shunter’s cabin being installed to make up the permanent connection with the national railway system. The rest – as they say – is history.

Congratulations to long-time Swanage Railway volunteer and driver Steve Barker a well as everyone else involved in the planning and execution of such a splendid and historic event.

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To visit the other pages featuring Andrew P.M. Wright's photos of the Diesel Gala, please follow these links.
- To visit the second page of photos please click here.
- To visit the third page of photos please click here.
- To visit the fourth page of photos please click here.
- To visit the fifth page of photos please click here.
- To visit the sixth page of photos please click here.
- To visit the seventh page of photos please click here.
- To visit the eighth page of photos please click here.
- To visit the ninth page of photos please click here.