False Starts, Near Misses and Dangerous Goods

by Geoff Body

  I got an early feel for the sort of people I would be working with from the nickname the local staff had given my deputy, the operations manager. He had been at Liverpool for some years and had come from King’s Cross where he was the assistant station manager. He was not afraid to tell staff how to run the job and frequently used the phrase ‘when I was at the Cross’ – the Cross being the term local people used when referring to King’s Cross. Liverpudlians quickly latched on to this, saying that he had come down from the Cross and giving him the nickname ‘JC’, which stayed with him at Liverpool until his retirement.

  Many changes happened around this time, including the conversion to merry-go-round working of the coal arriving at Garston Docks for shipment to Ireland and the Isle of Man. This involved a completely different method of working which required fewer local shunting locomotives and staff than had previously been the case. Some difficult meetings about the change took place with the local staff representatives who were not backward in telling their new area manager what they thought. At one meeting I was informed by the drivers’ LDC that I was called ‘The Smiling Assassin’ and ‘had done more damage around Garston than Hitler’. It did not help the temperature of the meeting when I responded, ‘Yes, it took him four years; it’s only taken me one!’ The formal record of the meeting recorded that ‘a full and frank exchange of views took place’. We did have a pint together on more than one occasion later once we had got to know one another better.

  Another major change to come in was the Driver Only Operation (DOO) on freight trains, with Garston-Willesden Freightliners being one of three trial flows, along with iron ore in Scotland and South Wales. To the surprise of many, the Garston trains were the only ones to run. This was no mean achievement, brought about by the managers and inspectors on the ground at Garston who performed the shunting duties and the chief signalling inspector who made sure that any signalman who wavered over signalling a DOO freight train knew very clearly on which side his bread was buttered.

  In the course of a difficult few weeks of change the local union branch secretary and I had a lengthy discussion after the local branch meeting. We agreed that although we could not agree professionally we would not fall out personally, upon which he invited me as his guest to an evening social event of the National Signallers Conference being held at nearby Southport. I was very pleased to accept, even if we did both get a few barbed comments from some of the ‘brothers’ there!

  All areas have their ‘characters’ and Merseyside was no exception. Reading the personal file of one I was to see, along with his advocate, I was struck with its thickness. It was full of incidents such as crossing gates run through, side rods bent on an O8 Class diesel shunting locomotive due to excessive speed and a fusible plug dropped on a steam locomotive. The one that really caught my attention, however, was when he was driving a DMU to Manchester that had been seen by a signaller with the cab lights on and an Alsatian dog apparently driving it! The seven bells ‘stop and examine’ train signal was sent to the next signal box where the driver was found to be in the correct position. His version was that, living on his own, he did not want to leave the dog alone and so took it to work with him. When his Weekly Traffic Notice fell on the floor and he bent down to pick it up the dog jumped into his seat!

  For the 1989 FA Cup Final between Liverpool and Everton we managed to run eighteen special trains including one VIP service for each of the teams. On paper this appeared impossible, but the local staff representatives indicated that we should do whatever was needed, even if out of the ordinary. Traction inspectors moved locomotives, guards worked stock from Downhill Sidings to Lime Street station and the departing train plan worked like clockwork with fans from both teams not needing to be segregated and willing to travel together.

  Unfortunately, this was more than could be said about the return, which went badly wrong when one of the early services was stopped at Rugby as a result of a passenger pulling the communication cord. Later services then passed the halted train, resulting in their approach to Liverpool being in the wrong order and totally messing up the drivers’ and guards’ workings. Several services had to be terminated at Edge Hill and run empty into Downhill Sidings while others were seriously delayed into Lime Street. The next day one of the local radio presenters gave us praise for the trip to London but a resounding ‘raspberry’ for the return journey. We were ‘guilty as charged’.

  Another memorable member of the staff was a signaller at Edge Hill Power Box, who found a very imaginative way of preventing delays when a locomotive derailment meant putting in SLW between Wavertree Junction and Edge Hill station. He later had an excellent book published about his career in signal boxes in the north-west entitled Sojourn of a Railway Signalman, which I enjoyed despite its somewhat derogatory references to my train regulating abilities whilst working the Edge Hill Panel!

  Not long after, I moved to the post of area manager at Crewe. I left Liverpool with many happy memories of the staff who had the success of the railway industry at heart. These included professional trade union representatives you could trust and do business with, but I guess that sums up the railway at most places in the country.

  DANGEROUS GOODS

  An unusual publicity promotion presented Philip Benham with a startling challenge

  Many years ago a well-known oil company used the advertising slogan ‘Put a tiger in your tank’ to promote the qualities of their petrol. Working in the Special Services section of the Nottingham division in 1971 the phrase took on a particular resonance for me, although mine was a different kind of ‘big cat’.

  In Special Services, which was part of the divisional passenger manager’s office, we were charged with developing new promotions to generate extra business. One of these ideas was to offer a combined travel and entrance ticket for a day out to the new safari park recently opened at Woburn Abbey. Passengers would take the train from Midland Line stations to Bedford where a coach would then take them to the park.

  Then someone hit on the idea of getting some publicity for the promotion by bringing one of the park’s residents to Nottingham by train where it would be photographed with the girls in the divisional office typing pool at Furlong House. The resident in question was to be a lion cub that would travel with its keeper from Bedford to Nottingham. There was then just the little problem of how to get lion and keeper to the divisional office in Furlong House about ½ a mile away from the station. Walking through the streets of Nottingham with a lion, even a young one on a lead, was not thought to be quite right. A volunteer with a car was needed.

  So it was that the morning came when I found myself at Nottingham’s Midland station with the task of transporting lion cub and keeper to Furlong House. Perhaps it was because of the film Born Free about a lioness and her cubs, but my image of lion cubs was of small, playful animals akin in size to a domestic cat. When the train from Bedford pulled in I soon got a rude awakening when an animal the size of a large dog emerged from the otherwise unoccupied guard’s brake van (the guard had wisely settled himself in the van at the other end of the train) led by her keeper on a hefty chain. The ‘cub’ did not appear to have enjoyed the journey, as she moved her head from side to side accompanied by the occasional snarl.

  We managed to negotiate the steps up to the ticket barrier and across the booking hall to where my Ford Cortina was parked. Now the lion cub had to be coaxed into the back of the vehicle. This was an interesting exercise as the car only had two doors, so the animal had to be pushed and pulled through the narrow gap behind the front seat. It was at this point that the keeper assured me she was really a very friendly lion and ‘unlikely to bite’! Safely installed, our young lady filled the whole of the rear seat, and when I got into the driver’s seat her fur brushed the back of my neck. Fortunately the business end of teeth and jaw were on the keeper’s side of the car.

  The couple of minutes’ journey passed uneventfully and the lion cub was welcomed, from a respectful distance, by the st
aff at Furlong House. The photo shoot with the girls in the typing pool went to plan and a picture appeared in that evening’s edition of the Nottingham Post. Job done! Memories of the day lingered, however, not least because of the all-pervading feline odour left in my car. But then it is not everyone who can say they have carried a lion in their car.

  SOMETIMES ALMOST FICTION

  A posting to Glasgow provided David Barraclough with some quite dramatic new experiences

  In the late spring of 1965 Eastern Region management considered that, after three years as goods agent at Boston, I should be moving on. I was directed to apply for positions, first as assistant goods agent at King’s Cross and then as cartage manager at Bishopsgate. After three years as my own boss I resisted these moves to London, but I was promptly called for an interview by the assistant general manager and told, ‘BR has paid for your traffic apprenticeship and you will go where you are told or the consequences could be severe.’

  A week later I was instructed to report for interview for the job of utilisation officer in the Glasgow division. After 40 minutes Divisional Manager Jim Urquhart seemed satisfied and I was offered the job. With a staff of twenty-four I was responsible for the distribution and effective utilisation of all rolling stock, plus electric and diesel multiple units, and in addition to my team of inspectors I was involved in such other things as standards for carriage cleaning. This wide remit was to produce some situations that were unusual, to say the least.

  I arrived in Glasgow a fortnight before the start of the Glasgow Fair Holidays when, to meet requirements for trains to English resorts, some 800 coaches had to be brought north to be cleaned and stored. When the exodus started the train guards would bring down the appropriate set from Polmadie yard to Glasgow Central station and unlock the doors on the platform side of the coaches. When, on one occasion, a platform change was made without anyone telling the guard all hell broke loose. Before a station announcement could be made suitcases were being used to smash windows and people were trying to join the train in any way they could. It proved a major task to get them out again, back to the concourse, and the damaged set replaced.

  During the football season, special trains were run to distant games, the number being determined by police resources. For local games cheap fares were used to persuade volatile fans away from regular services, and local police would be advised of the routes and times of the trains carrying fans. On a good day there would be few problems but it was not unknown for trains passing in opposite directions on the Edinburgh–Glasgow line to be stopped by use of the communication cord and for a battle to take place between the fans they carried.

  During this period carriage-cleaning depots were staffed mainly by female cleaners who were very good at their job but very much a group to be reckoned with: cheerful, often boisterous and apt to treat outsiders with scant ceremony. In November 1966 when we closed Buchanan Street station, the station staff and carriage cleaners there were given the option of either redundancy or filling vacancies at the Cowlairs Carriage Sidings. All the Buchanan Street cleaners were men and those at Cowlairs mainly women, including women supervisors. The Buchanan Street foremen claimed that they should have priority for the Cowlairs positions but both management and unions rejected this idea. With this unwillingness to work under women supervisors it left only a few male cleaners to opt to go to Cowlairs and not one lasted more than six weeks there before resigning. Perhaps they were wise, for one of the Cowlairs cleaning supervisors was ‘Big Margaret’ whose word was absolute law. She was not afraid to resort to physical action to deal with any intransigence and was quite capable of lifting miscreants off their feet and shaking them into the proper path!

  Working the traffic from the Ayshire collieries was an intense and complex business with a steady flow of traffic passing over the colliery lines to reach the exchange sidings with the main line. On the main line south of Ayr were Maxwell and Bargany quarries, the latter involving an uphill haul to the exchange sidings and then Kilkerran Bank on the main line. The volume of traffic meant that it was frequently necessary to ‘double the Bargany’ (i.e. work the trains with a pair of locomotives), usually the 2-6-0 Horwich-built ‘Crabs’ which, working hard, tended to produce impressive pyrotechnics. In dry weather it was Control’s practice to advise the Ayr fire brigade to stand by in readiness for any resultant lineside fires.

  The ‘Crabs’ were splendid engines, both uphill and downhill, and with excellent brakes, which was a necessity when working in the Ayrshire coalfield. In the twilight years of steam Ayr Shedmaster Bennett did a splendid job of maintaining availability, sometimes even having to resort to using string (yes, really) to keeps parts of the locomotives in place. This excellent manager and master craftsman also managed to maintain the fleet of Swindon three-car DMU sets that worked the Ayrshire passenger services on just one line in the steam shed.

  After steam was banished in 1967 we were given Type 2 diesel motive power, principally Class 25s supplemented by Clayton Type 1s south of the Clyde. The former were well received but the latter were ‘utterly useless’ and, to avoid lengthy delays due to failures, never let out on the line except in pairs – not infrequently three at a time had to be resorted too. North of the Clyde we had North British Type 2s returned from England on the basis of ‘you made them, now make them work’. Gingerly they were tested on a variety of workings, one of which proved memorable.

  The Scottish Region general manager laid on a two-day tour of the West Highland line in September for some VIPs, regional board members and two senior divisional managers. Using the general manager’s saloon and a North British Type 2 diesel, the itinerary was off to Mallaig, then Fort William and Corpach Mill aluminium works and local distillery. The diesel failed just north of Rannoch and only just managed to struggle into the station loop, and that was that. Control was told by headquarters to use the diesel off the 4.30 p.m. sleeper service to King’s Cross but refused to interfere with a revenue-earning service and sent a relief locomotive from Eastfield instead. The general manager’s saloon was delayed for over 4 hours, but the entourage had an excellent high tea at the Rannoch Hotel and were not too upset. Next day came the blunt instruction, ‘No North British Type 2s to venture on to the West Highland line.’ Sometimes problems worked out well!

  The occasional mishap sometimes had an unusual result. At 8.15 one morning there was some excitement in the Control office. A three-car DMU running empty from Shotts to West Calder to form a train to Edinburgh Waverley had struck a group of cattle that had strayed on to the line just short of Fauldhouse station. The resultant derailment saw the whole unit run up the platform ramp and come to rest upright and with no serious damage on the Up platform. Conveniently, it was not even fouling the running line to prevent other trains passing. It was, however, an interesting challenge for the breakdown train and crew.

  Our liaison with the BTP was effective and ongoing. One example occurred at 4.50 one evening when the police rang Control wanting to close Strathbungo signal box in order to arrest the signalman on duty. The deputy chief controller pointed out the disruption this would cause to the evening peak-hour trains from Central and St Enoch stations. I asked the BTP inspector why the signalman was to be arrested and, after a moment’s hesitation, was told that it was ‘on suspicion of murder’. It was a serious, dramatic and difficult situation but we agreed on a course that would keep the box under close surveillance for the 1½ hours of the remaining shift and then move in for the arrest.

  Theft was something of a problem in the Glasgow area. If a coal train was likely to be held up for more than a couple of hours we had to remove the wagon brasses before someone else did. Signalling and communications equipment was another vulnerable area. To combat thefts along the line we used a Signal & Telegraph (S&T) department gang in a Land Rover, carrying replacement equipment that could be deployed quickly to minimise train delays. However, after a time it became evident that there was a pattern in both location and modus operandi of th
e incidents. The BTP soon had the answer and were able to arrest our special S&T gang on duty and complete with their stolen material in the vehicle. The other shift gangs were warned and no more problems occurred.

  My time at Glasgow proved challenging, interesting and rewarding. The passenger business (long distance and local) was substantial and backed by extensive carriage-stabling sidings and fifteen carriage-cleaning depots. In addition to the coal traffic we handled the output of five major steelworks, substantial business in export bricks in Palbrick wagons, iron ore to Ravenscraig, daily loads of explosives at Ardeer and Vanfits for the two Johnnie Walker bottling plants. Among the other important movements were the overnight deliveries of bread to Oban for onward conveyance to the Western Isles.

  On the domestic front we lived on the third floor of a lovely, old stone tenement building where our doorbell at the entrance was still inscribed ‘Servants’. Our milk was still being delivered by a horse-drawn milk float from which the milkman also offered hot breakfast rolls – something of an essential in Glasgow. Less pleasant was the violent tornado of October 1967 when dustbins and bricks went flying past our windows.

  Before I left for Doncaster, my main sparring partner for three years, the leader of the Larkfield LDC, came to Hope Street to see me. This was the man who had once greeted me with the phrase ‘this is war’ and now said ‘how glad he was to see the back of me’. But ‘hard, but fair at all times’ he acknowledged and we shook hands and wished each other well.

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