BB/WC

Battle of Britain and West Country Classes were the same - except for the names, of course. There were much more obvious differences between un-rebuilt and rebuilt versions of both, though. Spam cans were very distinctive and therefore quite exotic beasts, especially for those of us in the north west of England. It seemed that we were far away from their home territory, at the time. I saw most of them eventually but eight managed to evade me before the end of steam on the Southern Region in 1967.

John Dyer photographed BB Class No. 34065 Hurricane at Exeter St David’s in 1960 at the head of the up Atlantic Coast Express. BB Class No. 34090 Sir Eustace Missenden Southern Railway and No. 34038 Lynton were both Waterloo-bound with expresses that had stopped at Winchester City during August 1965.