A WHIFF OF NOSTALGIA: WELL CHUFFED ABOUT HISTORIC STEAM LOCO VISITING THE BRIGG AREA

 

This year sees the tenth anniversary of an historic, preserved steam locomotive visiting the Brigg area.
Loco No 70013 Oliver Cromwell hauled a special excursion which picked up passengers at Barnetby station in 2009.
We joined the train there and so did Lee Fielden, the Brigg Town cricketer and Barnetby United footballer, and his wife Fiona. Oliver Cromwell then whisked 365 passengers on a capital day trip to London.
But scores more who did not get tickets on the Saturday train – ranging from pensioners to young fans of Thomas the Tank Engine – filled vantage points at stations, level crossings, bridges and fields across the area to watch, snap and video the by-then extremely rare sight of a steam loco drifting by on Network Rail tracks.
Such scenes had disappeared from North Lincolnshire in 1966 when British Railways decided steam traction, developed in Victorian times, had no place in an era of space travel.
Oliver Cromwell made an early morning start from Cleethorpes in 2009, picking up further passengers at Grimsby Town, Barnetby, Scunthorpe and Crowle before joining the east coast mainline at Doncaster.
Although pegged back by a string of signal checks along the route, and stops to take on water, the steam age survivor  – built in 1951 and a member of the National Collection of important engines saved from the scrapyard – performed admirably, arriving at London’s famous King’s Cross terminus four minutes early.
Passengers then spent the afternoon shopping, or sightseeing, before being hauled home by heritage diesel traction in the evening.
Lee and Fiona were making their very first trip on a steam-hauled mainline excursion.
After a memorable day out, Lee told us: “It was great and the food was fantastic. I really enjoyed myself. We only had to walk a couple of hundred yards to the station, and the next thing we were in King’s Cross. We had good food and good company.”
The very successful excursion was organised by specialist firm The Railway Touring Company.
Oliver Cromwell created plenty of interest among local railway enthusiasts in the run up to the weekend excursion. Word soon got round the loco was arriving, under its own steam, on Friday morning, travelling through the Isle of Axholme and Scunthorpe to Barnetby, to await its trip to London.
On the last day British Railways operated steam locos on its mainline - in August 1968 - Oliver Cromwell was among the locos employed to haul a farewell special, which was packed.
The following day the engine chuffed quietly through Lincolnshire on its way from the north-west to East Anglia to begin life in preservation.
Oliver Cromwell was a member of the Britannia class of express engines. Some other classmates, including Clive of India, Hereward the Wake and Robin Hood, were based in northern Lincolnshire during the early 1960s. Some duties took them through Barnetby, Wrawby Junction, Brigg, Elsham, Howsham and North Kelsey.

PICTURED ABOVE: Barnetby's Lee and Fiona Fielden  beside Oliver Cromwell in 2009.

Oliver Cromwell pulling into Barnetby station in 2009.