HALF A DOZEN Victorian and Edwardian steam locomotives, most of them unique, are set to move to new homes imminently after a massive change in which one of Britain’s longest established railway museums will all but disappear.
The industrial railway museum at Penrhyn Castle in North Wales is set to be transformed into a new ‘Industrial Penrhyn’ experience for visitors. The new museum will feature Penrhyn Quarry Railway Hunslet 0 ‐ 4‐0ST Charles taking centre stage, along with two carriages from the line. However, almost all of the other locomotives that have been on display at Penrhyn Castle for decades are being moved to new homes.
The hugely important 4ft gauge Padarn Railway 0 ‐ 4‐0 Fire Queen is perhaps the most high-profile machine to be re ‐homed. The 1848-built locomotive, which worked for the neighbouring Dinorwic quarry, has gone on display in Aberystwyth on the Vale of Rheidol Railway, along with the Padarn Railway director’s coach. Fire Queen will eventually return to its original shed at Dinorwic, in which it was stored from 1886 until 1969, which is being restored.
While Fire Queen is going ‘home’, Black Hawthorn 0 ‐ 4‐0ST Kettering Furnaces No. 3 is destined for an entirely new country. The 1885-built 3ft gauge locomotive is destined for a full return to operational condition to work trains on the Waterford & Suir Valley Railway in Ireland.
Restoration to working order for the first time since 1962 is due to be completed at an established railway workshop in northern England.
Another locomotive heading to a new home is Haydock. The 1879-built Robert Stephenson 0 ‐ 6‐0T will be re ‐homed at the Isle of Wight Steam Railway.
Hudswell, Clarke 0 ‐ 4‐0ST Hawarden is destined to return to the city of its birth (in 1899) at the Middleton Railway in Leeds for display. Meanwhile, fellow Hudswell, Clarke 0 ‐ 6‐0T Vesta, built in 1916, is moving to Bury Transport Museum, again for display.
