Farnsfield’s Shanks and McEwan Connection

[With thanks to Gill Sarre, Secretary of Farnsfield Local History Society, for providing the images and prompting this article, which can also be found in the current FLHS newsletter. They are an intriguing set of snaps and there may be more to the story than this, so, if anyone can add any more details or correct any misinterpretations, I’d be pleased to hear from them. My account is informed largely by the information written on the back of the photos, so, as the article stands, any assumptions I’ve made that are factually inaccurate are currently down to me.]

This set of six photographs of industrial steam locomotives attracted attention because of the mention of Farnsfield on the back of each picture, and they were subsequently acquired from the online market place that had advertised them. There were also further hand-written clues to what had brought them to “Farnsfield, Nr. Ollerton, Notts”. Each one mentions Shanks and McEwan, one adding “of Glasgow”, another “Farnsfield – Ollerton LMS/LNE contract 1929-1931”, a third “stored following a contract at Farnsfield c. 1939” and finally “to be cut up at Farnsfield 1942”.

Shanks and McEwan Ltd was a Scottish construction company, starting off in 1880 and becoming a prominent civil engineering firm involved with railway construction. It had also developed quarrying interests before settling on environmental services and waste management, including a landfill site at Corby. It still operates today under the name of Renewi, primarily in the Benelux countries.

The photos show the company’s name written across the flank of the engines. This shows that they were owned by the contractors and not built by them. It’s not possible to make out the information on the builders’ plates, which all locomotives carried, usually as oval-shaped brass or cast-iron plates attached to the cab side. The numbers given to the engines would be those describing their position in the company’s own fleet. Numbers 1, 49 and 82 are present and another is named Liverpool, with shots of both sides of that loco included. The engines are described as 0-4-0 and 0-6-0 saddle tanks, the former being the normal way that the size of a locomotive is classified - with reference to its wheel arrangement, and the second being how the engine carries the water it needs, in these cases in a saddle-shaped tank that straddles the boiler. There is a reference to “Peck” next to a number on the other side of the Liverpool engine. I think this refers to a locomotive built by Peckett, a well-known and prolific Bristol-based industrial locomotive manufacturers, though online lists show that the builder’s number given, 564, does not coincide with the date offered for construction of 1897. The smaller locos resemble Peckett’s W4 class.

So, what brought them all to Farnsfield in the first place, only for them to languish there for some time afterwards? Between the world wars the eastern part of the Nottinghamshire coalfield was still being developed and Bilsthorpe pit was due to open in 1928. The London Midland and Scottish Railway and the London North Eastern Railway proposed a new seven-mile-long joint railway line between Ollerton and Farnsfield to take out coal southwards. Using a junction at Farnsfield and opened in 1931, this allowed them to gain access to the existing former Midland Railway route to Southwell, before taking a spur beyond the town to join what we now know as the Castle line at Fiskerton Junction on the edge of the village of Morton.

Shanks and McEwan were presumably contracted to build the line, bringing in their own locomotives to get the job done. What seems to have happened after construction was over is that the engines were no longer needed elsewhere and were allowed to rot slowly in sidings at Farnsfield - of which there were sufficient number to accommodate them - before there were cut up on site in 1942. Perhaps the war effort needed the scrap metal more urgently by then. It’s possible also that the company had already decided on its move towards environmental services and away from civil engineering by that time, so the engines were suddenly surplus to their future requirements after completion of the new link.

Queen Street, Glasgow

Well, here’s a nice station with a good vibe. What’s so good about it? It’s got an overall roof and its neatly hemmed in within Glasgow city centre. Walking round its northern boundary, where the road overbridge allows you a peak of the edge of the roof at the station throat and just before the tracks plunge into a tunnel, it reminded me of Liverpool Lime Street. It’s the south facing façade, however, that gives Queen Street its special attraction. Its all glass but set at a jaunty angle. Along with the train shed roof, that makes for a very light and airy concourse. I found it quite uplifting.

I had been here once before, taking an Edinburgh train in 1972 and just having enough time to photograph English Electric Type Four No. 261 at the head of an Aberdeen express. Last week and over half a century later, this service was in the hands of the HSTs, now enjoying their well-deserved swan song years and clinging on at the two extremities of the UK network.

What the ____ am I doing here?

[Written for Writers Live Open Mic at Southwell Library on 24/11/23]

Every now and then, I go off on a train day. Firstly, I head for a railway station in the car. I make for one where I know I can park easily and cheaply and is in the general direction of the place I want to visit. I start my day at about 9, so that when I buy my ticket, I will qualify for a cheap off-peak return. I also then avoid the rush hour on the road and I have not had to get up at stupid o’ clock. I buy my ticket at the station, having worked out beforehand my itinerary and likely timings. Most stations I start at still have ticket offices, which I’m pleased to say is likely to continue to be the case, for now, at least.

On arrival at my chosen location, I make straight for the loo - regular bodily function plus my “Sorry to rush you” medication. Secondly, I find a station sign as a backdrop to a selfie on my phone, which I then send to my mates, along with a witty comment. The subliminal message is what a good time I’m having in my retirement and how extraordinarily adventurous and fit I still am, breezily careering around the country on a whim. No one replies.

Then a go and find a platform bench. It has to be somewhere out in the open with a good view of the action on the tracks. I prefer an old seat with authentic railway heritage, common on the former Great Western Railway, but less likely anywhere else. I sit on my bench and relax. I am suddenly thoroughly at home again. I have been doing this all my life, off and on. This is my time, in my choice of place. It is my diversion from my real life - the one that occupies all the other times and spaces. This is who I am, I decide again.  

Within seconds, though, I occasionally have a sharply contrasting thought. What the fuck am I doing here? I should be out helping people - driving old people to hospital or chopping down vegetation to maintain a wildlife corridor on the trail. I could at least be doing something more constructive, like completing a useful DIY task at home, or creative, like writing a book. Instead, I am being totally self-indulgent with no benefit to humanity at all, and at some cost to the environment, thanks to my otherwise unnecessary car journey to the station.

So, what am I actually doing here? I’m writing down train numbers, looking up those numbers in a list in a book, in preparation, if I haven’t seen them before, for underlining them with my six-inch plastic ruler when I get home. I’ve been doing this for 62 years. I still get a buzz out of creating continuous runs of underlined numbers and even more so when I have seen all the locomotives in the same class to complete the set. Then I stop recording them, of course, now barely recognising their formerly so important digits.

Is this my version of the hunter gatherer gene? I’d have been crap at the hunting bit, for sure. Nevertheless, should I have given it up about 57 years ago? Maybe, but when steam ended and my friends packed in, I carried on. I must have needed it more than they did. In my twenties and thirties, when I was too embarrassed to admit to still being a train spotter, I wrote down the numbers in the margin of my dual-purpose copy of the Guardian during any rail journey I made. I obviously didn’t want anyone to think I wasn’t cool or anything.

My next move is to take some photos of trains. I like the challenges this poses. I have a modestly priced camera with a pretty decent telephoto lens, but no way have I mastered the art. Nevertheless, I get a kick out of trying for a clear image, a variety of subject matter, interesting angles, uncommon background settings and imaginative compositions. When I look through them all afterwards on the computer screen at home, I see that most of them have surprisingly morphed into some rather ordinary three-quarter front-end snaps of trains with no artistic ingredient evident at all.  

It must be lunch time. I won’t allow myself food until mid-day, unlike the early days when I’d finished the lot by half eleven. I absolutely love my one round cheese sandwich with crisps, enjoyed on my bench and surrounded - up to a point - by the sights and sounds of my youth. I can even get a decent cup of coffee to go with it these days. Now that is an improvement.

I always leave the station but never venture very far from it. I’m on the look-out for an all-encompassing view of the station frontage. This can sometimes be surprisingly difficult and is subject to the configuration of the surrounding roads and the lay-out of nearby buildings. I have come to appreciate many different aspects of our railway heritage as time has gone by, so it’s not just the trains that I’m here for. Station design varies enormously. Some I love and some I really don’t, but increasingly, I understand how things got to be how they are and I find that quite rewarding.

Back on the station, I also spend time watching people making journeys. I’m usually drawn to larger and busier stations, anyway, so usually they are railway junctions. Places where people change trains fascinate me. There are the seasoned, purposeful travellers who know the ropes and just where they are heading, so confident and assured. There are also those for whom the whole experience is clearly an unfamiliar nightmare. Am I on the right platform at the right time? Is my train the next or the one after that? Do I have to change again? Can I sit anywhere? Is it just first-class at the front? Where is the quiet coach? Is there a refreshment trolley on board or should I get a sandwich now? Luckily, these days there is abundant help available, with VDU displays updated to the second and those pervasive staccato and rather robotic station announcements, so much clearer to make out than in the past, though without the evocative regional accents.

Then there’s the parting and meeting scenarios, perhaps most dramatically played out these days at international airports and the London terminus stations. Heartfelt moments of human interaction, those being torn apart, and those ecstatic at the very moment of their timely reunion. Stations are also great mixers of social class. Anyone who thinks that’s no longer significant, I’d point towards Kate Fox’s Watching the English for a bit of an eye opener. There may be first-class seats and first-class lounges, but the barriers, concourse, platforms, buffets, as well as the corridors on trains, are universal mixing points, sometimes uncomfortably so for those who usually go for exclusivity.

By early afternoon I’ve generally had my fix. I want to make my journey home in daylight so that I can appreciate the landscape I’m passing through once more. I never read or sleep on a train. My eyes are glued to the window as the world outside unfurls. I also miss the evening rush hour on the road. People travelling home from work by car can be a tetchy and gung-ho bunch. I’m already looking forward to refashioning my notes for my next blog and to underlining those numbers, of course.

Time wasted? Not for me. I’ve kept the faith, gone back to base, revisited my past and found plenty to amuse, intrigue and even surprise me. When the die was cast all those years ago there was certainly an element of escapism in it for me. There was nothing troublesome about trains. They never caused upset or disappointment. I found solace, with or without my mates. Perhaps it is simply that old habits die hard and it just became engrained, eventually becoming something that I was pleased to be associated with and in the end even proud of. I’m glad I’ve got interests, even if others can’t get their heads round this one. It has also made me more tolerant and interested when it comes to anyone else with a less than mainstream pastime. Each to their own, life’s rich tapestry, etc.

So, where does the self-doubt come into it? Am I alone in this? I got it at work, too, before the end of my time there, and in a sporting context when I have been on the receiving end of a comprehensive drubbing and felt incapable of making a difference to the result. It is that sudden realisation that I may be wasting my time. Time is of the essence, after all. Time is ultimately what we have. Is it the Protestant work ethic thing giving me a guilt trip? Is it a legacy issue? “Mike Priestley. Trainspotter. He saw all his Britannias but fell short with his Class 47 diesels” may not cut it, but in the absence of a guiding force in any particular direction, I guess it’s just a matter of keeping on keeping on, as Alan Bennett so appropriately put it.

 

Macclesfield

The down platform was heaving with young people intent on a good Saturday night out in Manchester. It was only three in the afternoon. It seemed like they must have been issued with an alcoholic beverage of their choice when they bought their tickets. They were clearly starting as they meant to continue. Being a guard on the last train home to Macclesfield must be a fun shift.  

Macclesfield station is uninspiring. Though train services are relatively frequent on the electrified Piccadilly to Stoke route, the buildings are very much from the Modernist and Brutalist sixties era. There is no trace of the original station of 1873, built jointly by the North Staffordshire Railway and the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway.

Macclesfield itself was a pleasant surprise. The imposing town hall is perched on the top of a ridge next to the parish church and overlooking a tight-knit pattern of cobbled streets. We had no trouble finding cafes of individuality, that were clearly making an effort to please. Café ambience is so important, when you are using such places as a base for catching up with friends, and the first impressions created by the staff always seems to set the tone for what follows.

Back at the station, the delayed Manchester-bound train would have emptied the platform well before we’d finished our own afternoon refreshments of tea and cake. The party goers would have no doubt been hoping for a Pendolino from Euston equipped with a buffet to whisk them to the Northern Powerhouse. The alternative local Northern Class 331 unit from Stoke would probably have been totally dry.

 

Leeds

Just before the train slowly winds its way through the labyrinth of tracks that is the approach to Leeds station, you get a good view of Elland Road football ground. I’ve been there only once, and Wayne Rooney scored the winner. Proudly emblazoned across the side of the stadium that is visible from the railway are the words “The Jack Charlton Stand”. Even Jack might not have been able to prevent the Everton prodigy having his way on that night. Quite by chance, I had arrived there at the same time as the Leeds coach. An Evertonian, who had obviously been lying in wait for it, gave Nick Barmby a right mouthful for having dared to cross Stanley Park to play for the Reds. At the same time, I also exchanged a much more courteous hello with Dave Watson, not long after his own retirement from EFC. Such things stick in your mind.

I went through Leeds City by train a number of times in the 1960s, but I remember little about the station itself. It seems to have grown substantially while I’ve been away. It’s now got 18 platforms, plus the sub-divisions [a, b, c and d]. Its very busy with both people and trains. In fact, there have been a whole series of alterations and additions to the station since the start of the millennium. The modern overall roof unfortunately cuts out a lot of the natural light from the platforms, not helped by an overcast November day. Two spacious footbridges and a wide paved concourse link it all together. A vast illuminated overhead screen showing every possible destination from A to Z gave a clear indication of the variety of routes you can take from here to all points of the compass.

I headed for the entrance. There are plenty to choose from, though none seem to give the station the grandeur its size and regional importance deserve. In addition to the more recently added southern entrance, one is to the main car park and the access point for buses and taxis, one is totally dwarfed by the adjacent, imposing, Grade II listed Art Deco Queens Hotel [built by the LMS railway to replace an earlier one on the same site], and the fourth currently has temporary sheeting in front of it while work goes on unseen behind the divide. The food hall and retail area that links the platforms to the City Square exit is a very attractive period feature, however. It is William Henry Hamlyn’s North Concourse, also dating from the 1930s, when two former stations were replaced by a modern Leeds City. A light, airy and attractive space, it was bustling at lunchtime and my guess would be that many of those enjoying a break were not there for a train, at all.

Given that this station has clearly evolved in stages in response to pressing needs and increased demand, they have actually made a good job of marrying the [not so] old and worthy of retention with the steel and glass that signifies the modern era. The overall envelope can’t have changed very much over time, as it’s bound up within a city centre site, but rationalisation and improvisation have allowed it to develop to become the third busiest station in England outside London. It may never see HS2, but an emphasis in future on improving services between northern cities suggests that Leeds will just carry on adapting, as it has obviously done regularly since the nineteen thirties.

Farnsfield Heritage Trail

Farnsfield Heritage Trail was officially launched at an event in the Village Centre on New Hill on Saturday 4/11/23. It has been created by the Farnsfield Local History Society http://farnsfieldlhs.co.uk and is accompanied by a tastefully produced pocket guide to the village’s most notable historic buildings, all found at various locations along Main Street.

The table top display of photos also included a view of the station house at the junction of Cockett Lane and Station Lane. Opened in 1871 by the Midland Railway, the Mansfield to Southwell route was relatively short-lived. The village’s station closed to passengers as early as 1929. Farnsfield also had a goods depot, visible in the distance on the photograph. Freight trains continued to pass through Farnsfield until 1964 and outbound coal traffic finished in the following year. The goods shed was then used to store pantomime scenery for a time and also suffered a serious fire that removed the roof, before it was transformed into a sizable, modern family house. The station house also became an attractive private dwelling. The photo shows the view eastwards towards Southwell, sometime after track removal had taken place and before the development of the Southwell Trail on the former track bed for recreational purposes. There is an interesting account of the line in the book by Paul Anderson and Jack Cupit, entitled An Illustrated History of Mansfield’s Railways.