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Dying days at the end of steam

30/ 8/2008

IT’S 40 years ago this month that the age of steam ended on British Railways.

After 130 years of continuous running, the embers flickered and died in August 1968, although, in truth, steam trains in Britain gradually began disappearing in the early 1960s, not long after Dr Richard Beeching wielded his famous axe, decimating the country’s railways at virtually one stroke.

But Lancashire remained the last outpost of steam and as diesels and electric locomotives took over, the area became a Mecca for steam enthusiasts – and Rochdale was virtually at its hub.

The Manchester to Leeds railway via Rochdale and the Calder Valley first opened for business on 4 July 1839.

The Summit Tunnel was not opened until 1841 so that section had to be bypassed by stage coaches!

Rochdale’s first station was near Moss Lane, although to get to the then unfinished station, passengers had to walk across the pub yard from the appropriately named Railway Inn.

According to author Jeffrey Wells in his book ‘An illustrated history of Rochdale’s Railways’, the station was greatly extended between the 1860s and 1870s and a new station on the current site opened for business in 1892.

It was state-of-the-art at the time, both in its architecture and layout.

For the next 30 years the station was served by taxis and trams (which it’s hoped will return in 2013) as well as trains – and it has undergone several changes since then.

But before steam came to an end in 1968, it was always a busy if somewhat gloomy place, with the glory days of steam reaching their peak in the 1950s when a typical summer’s day would see up to 200 departures and arrivals between 4.49am and midnight.

Rail enthusiast Richard Greenwood, who for many years kept a meticulous record of steam working in the Rochdale area, says that although the Calder Valley line went ‘all diesel’ in January 1962 (the Oldham Loop had been diesel operated from June 1958) the 2.08am service from York to Manchester Victoria alternated between steam and diesel and there were also summer excursions hauled by steam engines from Liverpool or Manchester via Rochdale to Scarborough and a Bradford to Llandudno and return train also ran through Rochdale.

Some steam services on the Rochdale to Bolton line, via Castleton and Bury, remained in the 1960s, although in April 1966 that section, too, was converted to all diesel traction.

Mr Greenwood records that Saturday 18 May saw the last scheduled steam-worked passenger train at Rochdale on the 2.08am York to Victoria mail, worked by Black Five No 45310, although some freight services were still operated by steam engines.

The last steam-worked cross-Pennine service was seen trundling past Summit West in the early hours of 28 June 1968 and the next day the last steam locomotive from Bolton Shed saw it at work as a pilot engine in Castleton.

July and August saw plenty of steam specials in the Rochdale area as enthusiasts took advantage of what they thought was the passing of a golden era.

Today, of course, there are many steam specials, both on preserved lines and main lines, but in August 1968 when steam drew its last breath, the future of steam-hauled trains looked very bleak indeed.

The last local steam train working through Rochdale was on 4 August 1968, a Railtour behind engine Nos 48476 and 73093, which ran from Thorpe’s Bridge via Shaw, Rochdale and Castleton to Bury.

In his journals, Mr Greenwood recalls that the train was two and a half hours late at Castleton – track labourers had gone for a long lunch in the pub thinking they had all the time in the world!

Another steam visitor to Rochdale in September in 1968, a month after the official demise of steam, was loco No 73050 on a special working from Newton Heath shed to Peterborough for preservation on the Nene Valley Railway.