Alas, shamefully, it's been a while since I posted anything because other things have got in the way. However, apropos of nothing in particular, a recent visit to the shoe shop reminded me of Southampton Docks and the occasion on which an ex-Southern Railway USA Class tank engine destroyed one of my shoes
When I was about 10 years old, my father organised the "trip of a lifetime" for me to see the Cunard Liner "Queen Mary" at Southampton. That's the first liner of that name, launched in 1934 carrying around 2,100 passengers and 1,100 crew. Length overall around 310 metres or just over 1,000 feet. The two pictures below will give some idea of the scale of the ship, inside and outside. It had 24 boilers to produce steam for the turbines which drove the ship. Each of the boilers seemed to be larger than our house. The scale of the whole thing was totally overwhelming to a small boy let alone the concept that something of this size could free itself from its pier and set out across the Atlantic
(Images may be subject to copyright)
So, I was duly impressed, but what my father didn't know was that in advance of the visit, I had researched motive power around Southampton Docks and become utterly obsessed by the ex-Southern Railway USA Class tank locomotives of which there seemed to be about 14 built in 1942 or thereabouts, the year I was born, and working around Southampton Docks. I regarded them as my brothers, they were as ugly as sin and I was determined to see one in close up whatever the consequences. The picture below will give some idea of what the engine looked like
(Copyright Mike Morant)
Because my father was a high ranking official with the British Transport Commission we seemed to have access to railway and dock property by unconventional means. Thus it was that our route to the Queen Mary appeared to lie across a vast marshalling yard. On the way there, I could see no sign of my beloved tank engines, but on the way back, I was convinced I could see the unmistakably ugly lines of one in the distance. I was convinced it was moving towards us and I needed to stall for time so I could see it close up
My inventive mind decided that I should pretend that my foot was jammed in a set of points and I couldn't get it out. By the time the loco was close enough for me to see properly, I would just lift my foot out and run across to be with my father. Except that when the time did come, my foot was actually stuck, totally! "Help!" I howled at my father as the USA tank approached at a smart lick "My foot's stuck!" Tuning in rapidly, my father leapt over a number of railway lines and grabbed me. After all, it would not be appropriate for the young son of a high ranking official to be chopped into several pieces in a railway marshalling yard! Nowadays you would not even be able to get near that kind of thing. And quite right too!
Anyway, my father solved the predicament by wrenching my foot out of its shoe and escaping to the far side of the marshalling yard. The USA tank clanked past with an angry hoot of its whistle and the driver leaning out of the cab shouting something which my father said he couldn't quite hear. "Wait here!" said my father grimly. He returned shortly afterwards with my shoe which, neatly severed, bore the unmistakeable signs of a close encounter with an ex-Southern Railway USA Class tank engine. "Right!" he said "We need a shoe shop! And if you tell your mother about this, the same thing is likely to happen to your head!"
Every time after that when I saw 30068 underlined in my Ian Allan British Railways Locomotives 1953 Combined Volume I got the shakes
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