GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

Widney Manor Station: gwrwm1897

Ex Great Western Railway 2-6-2T 5101 class large prairie No 4133 in lined green livery on the up main line, arriving at Widney Manor station with the 6:05pm Birmingham Snow Hill to Leamington Spa suburban passenger service on 25th June 1963. In the background, stock piles of coal can be seen in the former goods yard. The connection to the goods yard had been taken out of use in the previous month, while the adjacent up relief siding and controlling ground frame was retained until 10th November 1963.

Locomotive No 4133 was built in October 1939 at Swindon Works as part of lot 323. The 5101 class introduced in 1929 was an updated version of the 31xx (later 51xx) class, the first of which had been built in 1903. Externally the 5101 class differed from their predecessors by having curved drop ends, flanged motion plate and outside steam pipes. The cab roof was lowered and the coal bunker extended to hold four tons. The water tank capacity remained the same at 2,000 gallons. The class were adorned with copper capped chimneys and brass safety valves. The superheated standard No 2 long coned boiler operating at 200 lbs produced a tractive effort at 85% of 24,300lb, placing the locomotive in power class D. The maximum axle weight was 17 tons, 12 cwt, which limited the locomotives to main lines and some branch lines (Route colour Blue).

The power, speed and particularly the acceleration of these locomotives made them ideal for the Midlands suburban passenger duties where there was a requirement for frequent stops with heavy loads. As a result many of the 5101 class were allocated to the Wolverhampton division, but their useful life was curtailed by the introduction of DMUs in the late 1950s. No 4133 was initially allocated to Swansea East Dock shed (SED). Prior to nationalisation in December 1947, No 4133 was located at Newton Abbot shed (NA) and was known to be there two years later in August 1950. In March 1959, No 4133 was known to have been allocated to Weymouth shed (71G) and in October 1964, No 4133 was finally withdrawn from Leamington shed (84D).

The first coach in the rake is a brake third, corridor carriage to diagram D127. Seventy-nine of these 61 foot long coaches were constructed in four lots (Lots 1594, 1595, 1624 and 1642) between 1938 and 1941. Their large windows resulted in them being nicknamed ‘Sunshine stock’. By the time that this photograph was taken many of the non-corridor high capacity suburban carriage stock had been scrapped, but the replacement DMUs were struggling to accommodate the numbers of commuters on these popular routes. As a result, mainline coach stock was formed into six coach sets and pressed into service behind the large prairie locomotives.

Robert Ferris

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