The gloucester to ledbury branch

Two Churchward locomotives, ‘2800’ 2-8-0 No 2815 and ‘4500’ 2-6-2T No 4521, are at the country end of Gloucester (Central) in the early 1950s. With the ‘Small Prairie’ awaiting departure time at the head of a down stopping train, No 2815 trundles through on the down centre road, heading for South Wales with a train of mineral empties. From the initial batch of ‘2800’ class heavy freight locomotives, No 2815 was built in 1905, had by now run 1,300,000-odd miles and was with its 13th boiler; the Churchward 3,500 gallon tender is No 2037 of 1918. From 1937 and until being scrapped in 1959, No 2815 was Severn Tunnel Junction-based, and its only unusual happening had been back in 1908 when derailed on catch points at Quakers Yard loop with a goods train, and two years later the same thing happened at the same location. Although built with straight drop frames and rebuilt with the curved variant, it would never gain outside steam pipes.

Author

On Thursday, 6 May 1954 I was lucky enough to be staying with my aunt just outside Bristol, which gave me the opportunity to travel to Gloucester, and then to board the branch line train to Ledbury, a cross-country link between the original South Wales main line and the route between Worcester and Hereford. The official distance noted in working timetables was 18 miles 79 chains between the two main line stations, with seven intermediate stops, albeit four of those were denoted as halts.

It is exactly 70 years since I made this journey, so to refresh the grey matter a perusal at the line’s timetable has helped, which seemingly remained largely unchanged from the late 1940s and into the early 1950s. Due consideration of the daylight in certain of my views (and the paucity of service provision) leads to the assumption that I managed to board the 9.20am train from Gloucester, one of only five down passenger services on Mondays to Fridays; in early British Railways days there was also an added Saturday evening train out at 9.25pm from Gloucester and departing Ledbury on the return at 10.20pm, but that ceased to operate at about this time; there was no Sunday service.

With my original