GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

Warwick Station: gwrw370

Great Western Railway 2-8-0 28xx Class No 2872 pulls slowly out of the up refuge siding with a long class K freight train in the early 1930s. The train class was indicated by the head lamp positions, in this case a single red painted lamp on the right of the buffer beam. The Great Western Railway changed the colour of the head lamps to white in December 1936, but this was a gradual process and there was a transitional period during which lamps of both colours were used. A class K train is described in the General Appendix to the Rules and Regulations (issued Oct 1920) as an Ordinary Goods or Mineral Train stopping at intermediate stations.

The up refuge siding could hold 72 standard wagons in addition to a locomotive and brake van. Sometime after 1929 the up refuge siding was provided with a water crane at the south end and in June 1944 the siding was converted into a goods loop (for 68 standard wagons in addition to a locomotive and brake van) by the construction of a facing connection at the northern end.

Locomotive No 2872 was built in November 1918 at Swindon Works as part of lot 210, The 28 locomotives in this lot had been ordered during the First World War to assist with the demands of shifting Navy coal (see details in GWR Index 6). The 28xx class were designed as heavy freight engines and in superheated form had a tractive effort at 85% of 35,380lbs (Power Group E). They were initially restricted to the main Red routes, until reclassified for the lighter Blue routes in July 1919. The same superb design continued to be built with few modifications for almost fifty years and most of the class remained working until the end of steam. Only the purchase of the cheap war surplus 2-8-0 ROD locomotives stopped the extension of the class during the interwar years. They reliably operated both the heavy coal traffic from the South Wales collieries to the principle conurbations and also the unseen elite named vacuum freight services which operated nightly.

No 2872 was originally allocated to Llanelly shed (LLY) in South Wales and was still there in January 1921, but the locomotive subsequently moved to the Midlands for in January 1934 No 2872 was known to have been allocated to Banbury shed (BAN) and in January 1938 was known to have been allocated to Tyseley shed (TYS).

In October 1945, No 2872 was the first Great Western Railway locomotive to be converted to oil burning as part of an experiment because of the shortage of good coal. The experiment was carried out in conjunction with the Anglo-Iranian Oil Co. Ltd. to afford useful data for determining the extent to which economies could be effected by the use of oil instead of coal. By mid 1946 the experiment was deemed a success with ten 28xx locomotives successfully converted. These converted locomotives were renumbered to help recognition and No 2872 became No 4800 in December 1946.

In the early months of 1947 national coal shortages become so severe that domestic coal was rationed and the lack of coal for power stations resulted in power cuts. The government authorised a programme to convert to oil burning 1,217 locomotives (including 172 from the Great Western Railway). Only seven oil depots had been commissioned allowing operation between; the South West, Wales and London and the converted locomotives were allocated to one of these oil depots. No 4800 was known to be at Llanelly Shed prior to Nationalisation in December 1947. Although the programme was technically a success, the cost of importing the oil was prohibitive and the logistics of supplying the oil to depots required unavailable capital expenditure, as a result the programme was officially abandoned in September 1947. No 4800 reverted back to coal burning and the original number (No 2872) was restored in September 1948.

Locomotive No 2872 remained in service until August 1963 when it was withdrawn from Severn Tunnel Junction shed (86E) to be scrapped the following year by Cooper's Metals of Sharpness.

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