The seventh volume in this series and this time our one hour long production includes Carlisle, Edinburgh, Glasgow Buchanan Street, Stirling, Thornton Junction and Perth before ending at Aberdeen.

From Carlisle we travel to Edinburgh on the Warwickshire Railway Society’s three day epic tour in 1966. Steam action is seen a plenty at Waverley station, plus the diesel hauled Royal Train in September 1964. We spend time at St. Margaret’s shed as well as the new marshalling yards at Millerhill. The Railway Society of Scotland’s J36 tour takes us to Portobello, Musselburgh, Smeaton and Corstophine before we explore the former Caledonian Railway’s Princes Street station.

Another new marshalling yard was built at Thorntom Junction where we see J37s, J38s, B1s and WD 2-8-0s all working on the then expanding coal traffic around Fife. Our journey then takes us to the “other” Forth Bridge at Throsk, near Alloa.

A surprise for many enthusiasts was that the final home for Gresley’s A4 Pacifics was not the East Coast Main Line but on the 3-hour expresses from Glasgow to Aberdeen. By May 1964 all the remaining class members were allocated to Scottish Region sheds bar one, and they settled down to several good years of work on this route being quite at home on the tightly timed 3-hour expresses.

We visit the Glasgow terminus of these 3-hour expresses at Buchanan Street before moving on to Stirling to watch the steam activity there including the last workings of Stanier’s Coronation class Pacifics. At Perth more steam action is seen at the station plus a visit to the shed.

Our journey continues via Coupar Angus, Stonehaven and Cove Bay before concluding at Aberdeen. Here we see the joint station that opened in 1867 and then visit Ferryhill shed which was the home, in June 1965, of seven A4 Pacifics.

All the archive film was filmed entirely in colour and mostly during the 1960s. An authentic soundtrack has been added along with an extensively researched commentary complementing this nostalgic look at the railways in Scotland.

Gresley’s A4 Pacifics

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B & R No. 194 DVD Scottish Railways Remembered Part 7

Celebrating the A4s – Images From The Transport Treasury Archive Compiled by Hector Maxwell