GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

Olton Station: gwro1582

Ex-Great Western Railway 4-6-0 49xx ‘Hall’ Class No 5985 ‘Mostyn Hall’ has been given a clear route north and prepares to leave the Down Main platform at Olton Station at 8:16 a.m. on Wednesday 19th August 1959. The train had left Leamington at 7.45 a.m. heading for Birkenhead. It contained eight coaches, the first of which was No W5125W an ex Great Western Railway 58 foot long, corridor brake third coach, to diagram D95, built in June 1928 under Lot 1384. Locomotive No 5985 was built at Swindon Works in October 1938 as the last locomotive in Lot 311. This was the 186th locomotive of the Hall class, which eventually totalled 330 locomotives, built between 1928 and 1950. Although limited to Red routes the Hall class proved to be a most successful mixed traffic locomotive, handling both freight and express passenger services. At nationalisation at the end of December 1947 this locomotive was known to have been allocated to Westbury shed (WES). No 5985 remained in service until almost the end of main line steam, being finally withdrawn in September 1963 and sold for scrap to Cooper (Metals) Ltd, Swindon.

Robert Ferris

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