North-Western Freight under Steam

The film shows steam-hauled freight on British Railways, mainly in 1967. The film begins at dawn at Manchester Victoria station, featuring LMS Class 8F 2-8-0, Class 5 4-6-0 and Class 2 2-6-0 locomotives on shunting and freight duties.

This is followed by a view of freight trains on a misty Spring morning at a large complicated junction near Wigan where LMS Class 8 2-8-0 locomotives require banking assistance when hauling coal trains between Platt Bridge, Bickershaw and Hindley Green on the steep 1 in 30 gradients near the Cromptons ponds up to the bridge over another line. LMS Class 5 4-6-0 and a BR Britannia Class 4 6 2 pass by on light engine workings. This section of the film concludes with a shot of an LMS Class 5 4-6-0 at Darwen on a mixed freight from Blackburn to Bolton.

In April 1968 LMS Class 8F 2-8-0 locomotives are hauling mixed freights from Liverpool Port near Edge Hill, and coal trains at Todmorden, Rose Grove and Accrington. These sequences are interspersed with shots of LMS Class 5 4-6-0 on mixed freights near Manchester and Bolton.

After viewing LMS Class 5 4-6-0 and BR Class 4 4-6-0 at Rose Grove and Tebay locomotive depots, we see these classes in action between Tebay and Shap, both on and off the footplate of a Class 4 4-6-0 on ballast train duties during August 1967. Action then moves to the Settle - Carlisle line where BR Class 9F 2-10-0 and LMS Class 5 4-6-0s are found hard at work.

Finally the film returns to Tebay where mainline freights work through the Lune Gorge, collecting water from the Dillicar water troughs. The film ends with a view of one of the last bankers, BR Class 4 4-6-0, assisting one of the last steam-hauled passenger trains between Tebay and Shap during August 1967.

This film is featured on the DVD "Britain in the Days of Steam". 

North-Western Freight under Steam	Date of Film: 1994	13 Minutes
Places and Dates of Identifiable Locomotives: Manchester Victoria (February? 1967) LMS Class 2 2-6-0 46437 and 46506, LMS Class 8F 2-8-0 48553 and 48136; Wigan (May? 1967) LMS Class 5 4-6-0 44831 and 44761, LMS Class 8F 2-8-0 48449, 48764, 48648 and 48678; Liverpool (April 1968) LMS Class 8F 2-8-0 48692; Bolton (April 1968) LMS Class 5 4-6-0 45203; Rose Grove (April 1968) LMS Class 5 4-6-0 44899; Tebay (August 1967) BR Class 4 4-6-0 75026, 75024 and 75037, LMS Class 5 4-6-0 44792 and 44727; Settle-Carlisle (August 1967) BR Class 9F 2-10-0 92223, LMS Class 5 4-6-0 45273 Also in the archive are some extra clips which were originally in this film but eventually excluded from the final version. They show: Settle (January 1967) BR Class 4 4-6-0 75027 (now preserved); Shap (January 1967) 45048, 44761, 70047, 70014; Wakefield (December 1966) 90345

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