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Memoirs of a Railway Volunteer - Part 13

Discussion in 'Bullhead Memories' started by sleepermonster, Feb 13, 2015.

  1. sleepermonster

    sleepermonster Member

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    The Tunnel, The Tramp and the Winding Engine.

    Back in the middle 1980’s, if you were looking for railway track and did not have much money, the National Coal Board was a very promising source. In the aftermath of the miners strike so many pits were closing, and so were the private sidings which served them. One operation which came off involved the NCB sidings at Westhorpe Colliery, which was out in the boondocks on the Derbyshire/South Yorkshire border where there were some quite lonely freight lines.

    Not long ago I happened to be passing the area and went back for a look around. After the best part of thirty years, everything seemed to have changed. There was precious little to show there had ever been a colliery there, and when I found a footpath which led up towards the railway area, the old trackbed was covered in saplings and all the landmarks I remembered seemed to have gone. I pressed on and found the remains of old crossing timbers lying on their sides, and things began to click into place. I had rolled them over for inspection and rejected them, all those years before.

    The first contact came through Peter Bradnum, who had been speaking to the NCB area disposals officer. Peak Rail was, as usual, strapped for cash, but we were offered the chance to buy four turnouts and associated bits and pieces at a very reasonable price and I arranged to inspect the site with Arthur Dudson in the Autumn of 1986.

    We were given a guided tour by the colliery manager. Westhorpe had stopped winding coal, and the shafts were only used for transporting men. It was reputed to have the last steam operated winding engine in the country, and the row of great Lancashire steam boilers and the steam winder had been the manager’s pride and joy. Both they and he were heading for redundancy, and the manager made it pretty clear that he did not care what we did, and the meaning of “associated bits and pieces” would be left to our discretion. Part of the track had been lifted already, and the site was heavily blockaded to prevent itinerants from stealing the rest. Much of the sidings area was ankle deep in black slurry, there were of bits of track and scrap metal lying everywhere, but in amongst it all were two or three good B8 turnouts and a combined B8/C8 tandem which could be stripped to make two ordinary turnouts.

    Not far away, and very largely hidden in brambles was a large stack of sharp radius A switches and associated crossings which had obviously been forgotten for a very long time, which gave me grounds for thought.
    Arthur and I went over the turnouts to check them for wear and missing pieces. We were close to the British Railways tracks which were also out of use and slightly overgrown. Once upon a time these had been part of the Lancashire Derbyshire and East Coast Railway branch to Clowne, and the tracks now stopped just short of a tunnel at the end of the site, where there was also the disused Westhorpe Station.

    “Just watch out for the transvestite tramp”
    “Eh?”
    “Wears a skirt, lives in the tunnel and walks up and down the line to Killamarsh”

    Arthur and I marked up the turnouts and left, but there was no sign of the tramp that day.
    It took a few weeks to get the payment organised, and we arranged start work early in November.
    Moley went in first with his midweek team, and I followed up on the Saturday. The reckoning was that, in view of the particular risks of theft from this site all loose small components would have to be got off site as fast as they arose, and we arranged to rendezvous in the main colliery car park. The manager had unblocked the rear entrance to the colliery sidings, so we could come and go as we pleased. Moley turned up with Phil Brown’s five ton tip truck loaded with tools and we drove round to the work site in convoy. The party included several volunteers from the Peak Rail Sheffield Branch organised by John Rhead.
    There Moley proudly unveiled his hidden treasure – he and his team had already stripped all the keys and fishplates from a couple of turnouts and hidden them in a lineside cabinet.
    “Absolutely splendid Moley, but the turnouts we own are over there – these turnouts belong to British Railways”. I fear they were not reassembled.
    We set to work with jacks and hammers in the traditional style; from time to time the tramp went past – he had a beard and left us alone. The weather, as usual on winter salvage jobs, was vile and the volunteers were desperate for somewhere to get out of the rain. Nearby was an old and ruinous wagon checkers cabin which we patched up with rubble and corrugated iron and lit a fire in what was left of the grate. We carried sleepers through the slurry to sit on and made jokes about the Somme.

    It took two or three weekends to get everything dismantled. Unfortunately part way through the old checker hut got flattened, to keep the drug addicts away. Fortunately Les Whittaker had a motor caravan converted from an old ambulance, which we used as a shelter; thank goodness it had a gas ring and a kettle. We were allowed the run of the pit baths and given a guided tour of the winding engine and boiler house, which it was hoped would become a museum. The weather was still awful. At the end of each day Les filled the back if his caravan with wooden keys for firewood, later working up to complete sleepers.

    As soon as demolition was complete I organised the transport – a crane and three trailers plus a hiab brick grab and Phil’s tipper. Loading rails with a crane is usually a stressful job against the clock, and it is vital that everyone concentrates on priorities. At this point we were joined by Volunteer X, who made a beeline for the disused bay platform in the old station crying “LDEC chairs”, and proceeded to dismantle the track there. I was far too busy craning to deal with him and left him to it. We were loading all four good turnouts onto one trailer to take back to Buxton and the miscellaneous rails including the A switches was going for scrap.
    Once the track was loaded, the tipper was driven up and down with a line of men behind it who gathered up every last useable piece of metal from the trackbed. The crane driver was watching all this as he stowed his jib and packed up. He was heard to say:

    “They only let you lot in here to keep the Gyppos out and you’ve been worse than any Gyppos I’ve ever seen”
    There was a final small working party the following weekend to clear up and I called in to see how they were getting on. The manager came out to see us and wagged his finger at me.

    “You’ve all been very naughty.” But he didn’t really seem to mind. Les Whittaker was filling the back of his motor with sleepers for one last trip. It was indeed – the back axle snapped on his way home.

    Two of the turnouts were used at Buxton and were scrapped there after 1990. The rest of the material was used in the sidings at Darley dale and is still there, though I hear the timbers have now given up the ghost and have been replaced.

    A few postscripts: after we had gone the rest of the track was sold for scrap. Rather late in the day, an attempt was made to set up a colliery museum and to operate the branch as a preserved line, to be called the Rother Valley Railway (no connection with Robertsbridge). They laid 60 feet of rail and brought in a diesel shunter. John Rhead paid a visit and was tactless enough to say “I remember when there was track all over this yard”. The scheme did not survive; all trace of the colliery has gone.

    A few years after our operation someone donated some LDECR chairs to Chesterfield Council for an exhibition. I know where they came from.

    Going forward to about 2002, we were was struggling to complete one of the carriage sidings at Rowsley and I was around ten sleepers short when Les Whittaker came to visit. By this time he was not very well, but still game.

    “Do you remember those sleepers from Westhorpe? I’ve still got them in my garage” We collected them and finished the end of No.2 carriage siding. Sadly he died not long after that.

    Having happily scrapped around four sets of A switches from this site alone I am desperately seeking a set of A switch chairs for use at Wirksworth!

    Anyway, all the memories came back as I was looking through the saplings towards the station, which is now a very smart private house. At my feet was a chair screw, how on earth did we miss it?

    Tim
     
    OldChap, gwalkeriow, Sheff and 3 others like this.
  2. Sheff

    Sheff Resident of Nat Pres

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    I missed out on that one, probably due to being exiled in Swaziland during 85/86!
     

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