EDWARDIAN LADY RETURNS TO MARK THE END OF SOUTHERN STEAM - 5th July 2007

News Item and Press Release from Andrew P.M. Wright - dated 5th July 2007
Official photographer & press officer, Swanage Railway.
Photographs are copyright Andrew P.M. Wright unless otherwise acknowledged.
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To see the full set of 40 photos of M7 No 30053 on test runs on Wednesday 4th July, please scroll to the bottom of the page.

By Andrew P.M. Wright

An end of BR steam celebration would not be complete without the Swanage Railway’s flagship locomotive – the only working steam engine of its class in the world!

Thanks to many hours of hard work – and late nights – by Swanage Railway locomotive staff Frank Mead, Oliver Furnell and Graham Froud, LSWR M7 0-4-4 tank No. 30053 is ready to take part in the 40th anniversary end of Southern steam festivities.

The Edwardian lady first steamed out of the engine shed at Swanage – her home since April when No. 30053 returned to the Purbeck Line after an overhaul – on the evening of Monday, 2nd July, 2007.

One Wednesday, 4th July, 2007, No. 30053 spent the afternoon hauling four empty carriages – a test train to confirm that the M7 was up to taking part in the intensive train service that will be operated throughout the three days of the 40th anniversary of the end of Southern steam celebrations.

The driver for the special working was Bob Payne – who was part of the team that bought and returned the M7 to Swanage from the USA in 1987 – and the fireman was Billy Johnson.

Just after 8pm, the test runs were complete and M7 No. 30053 passed with flying colours.

After shunting its stock into the goods yard siding at Corfe Castle, the M7 returned light engine to Swanage.

M7 No. 30053 was designed in 1897 by Dugald Drummond and it was built at Nine Elms in London during 1905.

While in BR ownership, the M7 used to run on the Swanage branch during the first five months of 1964 before Bournemouth motive power depot’s allocated M7s were withdrawn from traffic in May, 1964.

Being push-pull fitted, it hauled trains on the ‘Old Road’ – also known as the ‘Castleman’s Corkscrew’ – between Poole, Broadstone, Wimborne, West Moors, Ringwood and Brockenhurst; a route which was shut in May, 1964, under the terms of the Dr Richard Beeching proposals published in March, 1963.

In 1967, M7 No. 30053 was sold to an American millionaire for his Steamtown railway museum in Vermont, USA.

Twenty years later, after the museum moved to Scranton in Pennsylvania, the M7 was sold to the Drummond Locomotive Society and returned to Swanage – arriving at the terminal station by road in April, 1987.

After restoration to full working order, M7 30053 hauled its first train out of Swanage since May, 1964, in the summer of 1992.

One-day rover tickets for unlimited day and evening travel are £15 for adults with concessions £10 while evening rover tickets for unlimited travel after 5pm are £4 for adults and £3 for concessions.