Railway steam, diesel and petrol in museum’s 2017 events calendar

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Amberley Museum launches its 2017 railway gala season on April 9, with an industrial locomotives day that will include public steam trains and demonstration freight runs by diesel and battery engines.

Supporting roles: Amberley stalwarts John Stanton (left) and Gerry Cork enjoy the comfort of a Wickham trolley on February 15, after their appointment as joint heads of the museum’s Rail Volunteer Group. The pair, pictured at Brockham station on the museum’s 2ft gauge line, have been volunteers at the West Sussex visitor attraction for a combined total of 63 years. GEOFF COURTNEY

The public steam trains will be hauled on the museum’s ½-mile 2ft gauge line, which has three stations, by resident 0-4-0ST Peter, built by W G Bagnall of Stafford in 1918 to 3ft gauge for the Ministry of Munitions and subsequently converted to 2ft gauge and sold to a quarry company.

It was withdrawn in 1949 and passed through the hands of several owners before being bought for preservation by the Narrow Gauge Railway Society and put into the care of Amberley Museum in 1983, returning to steam a decade later after 44 years out of traffic.

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There will also be passenger trains comprising a pair of Wickham trollies, and demonstration runs on the museum’s short standard gauge line featuring Burt, a Simplex 4wDM shunter built by Motor Rail in 1959 for a Kent timber merchant. The line runs for 150 yards beside an original block of kilns that formerly incorporated its own railway platform.

Read more in Issue 226 of HR – out now!


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