1920: Ferryhill P2 0-6-0 on Ferryhill Goods Turn 2 - Further Continuation
UK Turntables are, in my opinion, yet another asset which is under-represented. I have several turntables in various diameters by Paul Mace, particularly to help with the N.E.R.'s type of roundhouses (single or multiple turntables ilocated within rectangular buildings, along with 2995Valliant's 65ft GWR Turntable.
The journey along the Down ECML from Ferryhill to Birtley continues for the Ferryhill shed P2 Class 0-6-0 on Ferryhill Goods Turn Number 2. From Newton Hall Junction to Kimblesworth Colliery Junction Sidings.
Rounding the curve east of Newton Hall Junction towards Plawsworth. The line in the left background is the branch for Sunderland, which will join the Leamside line at Auckland Junction. There is a tall viaduct across the Wear on that line, along with a brick and tile works at Finchale. Also at that point for several decades was the connection to a wagonway serving several collieries at Pity Me (an anglo-saxon corruption of the Norman French term "Petite Mer" (
little sea) dating from the Norman Conquest. I do not know whether it referred to fishponds, a marshy area of lakes or was a jest by the Normans.)
Taking the facing turnout in to the sidings at Kimblesworth Colliery Junction. There were three loops here, built to exchange traffic for the colliery located at quite a higher elevation than the ECML and situated around a mile to the west. Kimblesworth Colliery is not shown in the N.E.R.A. reprint of the L.N.E.R. N.E. Area Newcastle District November 1927 Mineral Train Time Table (yet Esh Colliery on the Waterhouses branch is) so my belief is that the Colliery came under the Sunderland District MTTT and it appears that none has survived. In Colin E. Mountford and Dave Holroyde's "The Industrial Railways & Locomotives of County Durham Part 2 - the National Coal Board and British Coal" Kimblesworth Colliery was listed as previously owned by "The Charlaw & Sacriston Collieries Limited" putting it outside the larger regional companies. In N.C.B. days British Railways handled both shunting and traffic to/from the Colliery. This probably was done by the N.E.R. between the colliery opening in 1873 and the grouping, with the L.N.E.R. assuming the task between 1923 and 1947.
Durham Mining Museum lists output as "coal" up to 1896. From 1896 to 1921 output was "Coal: Gas, Household, Manufacturing". From 1930 to 1960 "Coal: Coking, Gas, Household, Manufacturing, Steam". Output in 1947 was 225,000 tons so it was a significant source of traffic. Peak employment there was 1,132 in 1921. While no accidents involving five or more deaths was recorded, there were 63 individuals who died in accidents at the colliery. While all were tragic, 13 year-old
Thomas Carr is notable for his youth. Killed August 16 1889 by being crushed between loaded coal tubs. Another eleven teenager deaths included;
Thomas William Layton, 14 years old, killed Nov 1st 1896,
J.W. Ramsay, 16 years old, unknown cause of death April 15 1885,
Richard Coyle, 16 years old, killed Jan 18 1901,
John Thomas Heslop, 16 years old, killed June 14 1918,
William Bruce, 17 years old, killed July 13 1883,
John Robert Allen Heslop, 17 years old, killed July 15 1910,
Robert Atkinson, 18 years old, killed Feb 18 1936,
Thomas L. Cocker, 18 years old, killed May 11 1885,
Robert Grieverson, 19 years old, killed Dec 3rd 1885
John Walton, 19 years old, killed April 9 1911 and
Robert Young, 19 years old, killed Aug 14 1930. R.I.P.
A washery was opened there during the 1950s and took in coal from as far away as East Hedley Hope Colliery (
on a wagonway to the west of the Waterhouses terminus of the N.E.R. Waterhouses branch). The colliery closed on November 3rd 1967.
I have a search on my hands to try and find which shed supplied the loco(s) which worked Kimblesworth Colliery and my thoughts are it was likely to be Durham, which was a sub-shed of Sunderland.
The three road wagons have been dropped off, to be worked forwards to Birtley at 11:15 a.m. stopping to work Plawsworth, Chester le Street and Birtley. I believe that this was a duty assigned to the locomotive allocated to work the Kimblesworth Colliery branch. Time to start trawling through the records to find a likely candidate among Durham's allocation. It seems my thoughts about Durham are misplaced. Examining some allocations for the 1940s and 50s the predominant loco is the G5 0-4-4T, with (later) a V3 2-6-2T and here and there an A8 4-6-2T or two. Not the first choice for working a colliery. However, Sunderland shed during 1938 had no less than twenty-seven 0-6-0s, of which ten were J27 and two J39. All probably employed hauling coal trains. Four N9 and two N10 0-6-2Ts at Sunderland shed in 1938 strike me as being well suited to work operating the Kimblesworth Colliery duty, as was the single J77 0-6-0T allocated to Sunderland.