From the Camel to the Exe - Preview

FROM THE CAMEL TO THE EXE

Padstow to Exeter in the Days of Steam

Images from the Transport Treasury archive

Compiled by Jeffery Grayer

‘The next five and a half miles beside the broadening Camel estuary to Padstow is the most beautiful train journey I know’. Thus wrote the poet John Betjeman seventy years ago in his collection of essays entitled ‘First and Last Loves’ and seeing the above image who could disagree. This view looking east showing the perfectly manicured permanent way and the curving estuary of the River Camel was taken on 1 July 1961 and just visible in the middle distance is the final member numerically of the Battle of Britain class, No. 34110 66 Squadron, with the Padstow portion of the down ‘Atlantic Coast Express’ (ACE) nearing the end of its 260 mile journey from Waterloo. (1796)

Above : On 1 July 1961 N Class No. 31837 rattles across the girder bridge spanning Little Petherick creek with the three coaches forming the last train of the day over the North Cornwall line, the 6pm all stations service from Padstow to Okehampton. It would take 2½ hours to cover the 62½ miles with 14 intermediate stops. A connection was available at Okehampton, after a 21 minute wait, into the 7.20 pm service from Plymouth, reaching Exeter Central at 9.48 pm. A marathon journey approaching 4 hours to cover just 88½ miles! The bridge consisted of three spans of 130 foot length with 8 foot diameter supporting cylinders filled with concrete which had been sunk 53 feet through mud to reach solid rock. The track crossed the bridge on a 20 chain radius curve with super elevation and on gradients of 1 in 132 down approaching the crossing. Special carriers, which can be seen on the top of the structure, were installed to carry telegraph wires across the bridge. (1802)

Above : Basking in the summer sun of 2 July 1961, the running in board at Camelford station reads ‘For Boscastle and Tintagel’, the connection for these two destinations being courtesy of Southern National bus service No. 122 which connected Bude with Wadebridge. Details of connecting bus services were usefully shown in the SR timetable although the connection off the ACE was hardly convenient, meaning a wait of 30 minutes for the bus but I suppose this was useful when the train was running late. Even in 1969, three years after closure, ‘Camelford Station Approach’ was still listed in the bus timetable for the re-numbered service 322 now operated by Western National following the merger with Southern National in that year. Today GoCornwall Bus operates a similar service but ‘Station Approach’ unsurprisingly no longer features in the timetable. The signal box seen on the up platform housed a Stevens 17 lever frame and the platform loop, which was extended in 1911, could accommodate lengthy 12 coach or 35 wagon trains. Goods services were withdrawn in September 1964 but the goods yard, the connection to which can be seen at the far end of the down platform, remained in situ for a further 14 months. (1813)

Top right : The 3.35 pm stopping train from Okehampton to Wadebridge is in the charge of No. 34030 Watersmeet as it enters Camelford station on 27 June 1961 at just after 5pm if running to time. This service provided a connection at Okehampton from the down ACE which did not serve all stations on the North Cornwall route. Some mailbags on a handcart on the opposite platform await the arrival of the last up service of the day, the 6.46 pm to Okehampton. Apart from brief spells at Ramsgate and Stewarts Lane depots when new, No. 34030 had been a long term Exmouth Junction resident since December 1948 and would remain there until withdrawn in September 1964. (1755)

Above : Situated at 199 miles and 22 chains from Waterloo, Meldon Quarry signal box dating from 1903 was kept busy with main line and shunting movements from the nearby quarry. The original upper storey weatherboarded cabin, which incidentally was secondhand, dating as it did from the 1870s, was set upon a masonry base although brick replaced the wooden structure in later years, probably in an effort to combat the weather experienced at this exposed location. Blasting was not permitted in the quarry when trains were passing by and at one time when the quarry face had been located nearer to the box, its windows had been protected by mesh to prevent damage to the glass from flying debris. A small staff platform, Meldon Quarry halt, was situated nearby, used by quarry workers and their families to access Okehampton via special workmens’ trains. The signal box closed from 22 March 1970 when all traffic from Okehampton was concentrated upon the down line. (LOSA 20849)

Top right : Class T9 No. 30313, which has charge of a train of ballast hoppers that it will shortly take down to Okehampton, is seen passing the platforms of the small staff halt on 11 August 1960. Also in view is Class O2 No. 30199 which at the time was the temporary shunter in use at the quarry as classmate DS3152, No. 30272, having finished duties here in July 1960, was not replaced until November 1960 when DS682, BR No. 30238, took over until it was replaced in turn by USA tank No. 30062, DS234 in December 1962. (TG425-5)

Crossing the aforementioned Fatherford Viaduct and under sunny skies, an unidentified Ivatt 2-6-2T runs light engine towards Okehampton. A quarry, with its own narrow gauge tramway which ran to a site near Okehampton station but which was lifted in the 1930s, was located some hundred yards from Fatherford Viaduct and was probably the source of the stone used in the building of this structure. (REV80A 4-3)

This panorama of North Tawton station dates from 1955 and reveals the grandiose nature of the facilities provided here at what became a relatively unimportant wayside station although several Waterloo services continued to call into the 1960s. It had not always been so however as the station had originally been opened as a terminus by the Devon & Cornwall Railway in 1865 serving the then important town of North Tawton some 1½ miles away and acting as a railhead for the area to the west not yet served by a railway as the line was not extended to Okehampton until 1871. The substantial footbridge was removed after closure and re-erected at Ropley on the Mid Hants Railway. (LSDC2620)

Giving a better view of the weir and sluice gates, this view dates from 21 July 1956 and reveals an unrecorded Bulleid pacific with a train from the SR about to join WR metals. A mobile crane is on site possibly to effect some modifications to the flood defences. (RCR7781)

Allowing diesel power to get just the briefest of look-ins, on the same unrecorded date a North British ‘Baby Warship’, latterly Class 22, diesel with four coaches and sporting headcode 2C51 indicating a Plymouth to Exeter service via Okehampton, passes the same spot. Part of the half timbered Cowley Bridge Inn can be seen on the far right. The lines over the bridges were singled in 1965 during repairs and this became permanent from January 1967. Today single track operates from the junction as far as Crediton. (5262)

No. 30313 heads the 5.51 pm service to Bude and Padstow at Okehampton’s bay platform on 18 August 1960. The train will divide at Halwill Junction with the Padstow portion proceeding first followed by the Bude portion some three minutes later. (WS4971)

The Okehampton signalman seen leaning out of his cabin window on 14 July 1959 watches, along with a porter and a colleague, the activities of No. 30338 which has just attached some container wagons to the rear of the train standing in the up platform. The signal box was a replacement dating from 1936 and it remained in service until 1972. (RCR13883)

30338 BUILT 10/01 WITHDRAWN 4/61

That vast swath of glorious countryside lying between the Rivers Camel and Exe contained the very photogenic route of the North Cornwall line. Terry Gough, Gerald Daniels, Dick Riley and many others whose photographic collections have passed into the safe keeping of the Transport Treasury fortunately recorded scenes from Padstow to Exeter on film. From Bulleid pacifics and the graceful Greyhounds to the humblest tank locomotive, and not ignoring the architecture of its wayside stations, their cameras captured images from the dying days of steam on this section of the sorely missed Withered Arm. Published by Transport

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