The complete steam news magazine

Chevallier heads for Llanfair gala

The locomotive, Manning Wardle 0-6-2T Chevallier, has several connections with the Mid-Wales line, and indeed has visited before, in 1991.

Chevallier was built in 1915 for the Chattenden & Upnor Railway, a line ran by the Admiralty in Kent. Years later in 1963 the fledgling preservationists of the W&LLR obtained their first passenger rolling stock from the Chattenden line, together with diesel locomotive Chattenden which still runs at Llanfair today.

In 1950 Chevallier was sold on from Chattenden to Bowaters Paper Mills in Sittingbourne, also in Kent. This system would later form the basis of the preserved Sittingbourne & Kemsley Light Railway, to which the W&LLR later sold on the ex-Chattenden rolling stock.

By this time, however, Chevallier had moved again, to the railway built to run through the wildlife enclosures at Whipsnade Zoo and Safari Park in Bedfordshire. Here the loco remained until 2006, when it was purchased from Sir William (Bill) McAlpine by restorer Bill Parker and moved to the Forest of Dean. In 2009 a heavy general overhaul began at the Flour Mill workshop, and it has just been completed.

“We need to make sure it works, and what better place than the Welshpool & Llanfair? A little bit of everything, and a lot of beautiful countryside, steep gradients and passengers, not to mention enthusiastic volunteers.”

“We are delighted to play host to this historic and immaculately restored locomotive and thank Bill for making it available to us,” commented WLLR general manager Terry Turner. “It will haul its share of gala trains and is bound to be a star attraction in GWR green with lots of brass and copper on display,” he added.

The W&LLR Annual Steam Gala will run from 3-5 September and feature a number of attractions in addition to Chevallier. The last locomotive to visit the W&LLR gala was Henschel 0-6-0 Siam from the Bredgar & Wormshill Railway in Kent, way back in 1995.