LMS Route: Rugby to Wolverhampton
LMS Route: Birmingham New Street to Lichfield
LMS Route: Birmingham-Soho-Perry Barr-Birmingham
LMS Route: Nuneaton to Birmingham New Street
LMS Route: Birmingham New Street to Tamworth
LMS Route: Evesham to Birmingham
LMS Route: Bournville to Birmingham New Street

Birmingham New Street - BR Period Locomotives: lnwrbns_br342

Ex-MR 2F 0-6-0 No 58271 with a plate bearing the code W721 on the bufferbeam stands alongside ex-LMS Fowler 4MT 2-6-4T No 42337 on the adjacent platform. Number 58271 was a MR 1873 class design built to Order No 4964 by Neilson & Co circa 1896 and carried the LMS running number 3492 and lasted in service until withdrawn from Monument Lane shed in June 1961 to be scrapped by Derby Works later in the year. Number 42337 was built by Derby works to Lot 53 in March 1929 and remained in service until withdrawn from Stockport shed in December 1963 for scrapping by Crewe works in February 1964. I have two photographs of this scene, one dated 30th May whilst the other is a week later being 6th June 1959.

Mick Bramich (an old 'arbun' name) writes "This image showing ex-MR 0-6-0 No 58271 was for many years the Harborne Branch Line locomotive. The engine was known affectionately by Monument Lane crews as ‘Molly’. I watched it often, as a boy on the way home from school, struggling up the bank from Harborne and having to pause for a blow up, or even reversing back to Harborne to shed some of its load in the goods yard. I also called the fire brigade on one occasion after she had set the Hagley Road cutting on fire with her efforts. I often saw her shunting at Hagley Road as well. This was all between 1957 and 1962 when she was replaced by a diesel shunter for the last few months of operation.

I may even have ‘cabbed’ her at Monument Lane shed, a regular Sunday morning bike ride in those steam days. I saw the last train with a pair of Ivatt 2-6-0’s but was unfortunately not aboard. I walked the track from Harborne to the junction with the main line after closure and a friend took lots of pictures. I do not have any of the prints.

My father was on one of the last passenger trains in 1934. One of the reasons given for closure at the time was that the Harborne station master’s daughter was coming home from school and the train was stopped on the bridge before the station and she mistook the stop for the station, opened the door, and fell to her death down the high embankment near the Chad Valley toy factory (possibly still the Mirror Laundry at that time).

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