Unidentified Highland Railway Castle Class 4-6-0 steam locomotive on train in LMS days
In 1900, Peter Drummond, produced his first passenger 4-6-0s namely the ‘Castle’ class for the Highlan. The first of the class, , appeared followed by numbers 141-5 in the same year. Successive batches were added in 1902 (146-9), 1910 (30) 1911 (35/26 – 8/43) and the final three (50/8/9) in 1917 when there was a drastic shortage of locomotives capable of handling the increased war-time traffic over the line, and a well tried type was urgently needed. The dimensions as built were: In 1923 all passed into the hands of the LMSR, and apart from new chimneys and the removal of the smoke-box wing plates, they remained practically unchanged in appearance. The ‘new’ owners renumbered them 14675 – 93 and using these numbers, the names carried were: 14675 – 9 Taymouth Castle, Ballindalloch Castle, Dunrobin Castle, Gordon Castle, Blair Castle . 14680 – 4 Murthley Castle, Skibo Castle, Beaufort Castle, Cawdor Castle, Duncraig Castle. 14685 – 9 Dunvegan Castle, Urquhart Castle, Brahan Castle, Thurso Castle, Cluney Castle. 14690 – 3 Dalcross Castle, Brodie Castle, Darnaway Castle Foulis Castle. The simple and robust design of the ‘Castles’ stood them in good stead for a considerable period and for most of their life they were stationed at Inverness, venturing seldom south of Perth where they took over the heavy through trains of the Caledonian Railway Company, and were even used on the Oban line during the 1930s. More modern types were tried on this section by the LMSR but it was not until the Stanier Class ‘5s’ became available to this section that the ‘Castles’ were gradually demoted to secondary duties prior to withdrawal between 1930 and 1947.
Size: 1827px × 2902px
Photo credit: © Digbydachshund / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: 1930s, 4-6-0, castle, class, highland, lms, locomotive, railway, scotland, scottish, steam, train
