As I say it all struck me as odd.

They restored a WW1 War Departmet Baldwin at great expense in a works they had set up in the far east, imported it into the uk where no one saw it, sold it and then promptly dropped dead.

I do wonder if it is all just an elaborate hoax.

my reading of the published material regarding the Baldwin, is that it was owned and restored by a third party unconnected with the scheme. The locomotive itself certainly exists, but any connection between the original owner and restorer, the subsequent purchaser and anyone at Smailbeach remains open to verification, at the very least.

I've seen the letter from the son referred to in the last post, probably on the same website. Quite what to make of it, I have no idea.

The SO2 website makes certain claims about cashflow, which would appear to be verifiable at Companies House by anyone with sufficient interest.

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...The locomotive itself certainly exists ...

Can you give any further details? I'm afraid I had concluded it was a figment of a school boy's imagination, but I'd be very happy to be proved wrong.

Ken Scanes

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join the SO2 yahoo group and read for yourself, and draw your own conclusions.

there are various mentions of the loco, scattered about the web. A number of such locos appear to have come to the ends of their useful lives around that time and been sold on to people who would spend the money to restore them, while they were still saleable.

We are now arriving at the point where there are very few remaining unrestored examples of locos from this period in viable condition, and the few specimens are being offered at huge prices; see correspondence in various places regarding the remains of ex-WD Hudson 4-6-0s in Nepal, for example.

There doesn't seem to be any real evidence that it was ever connected to the Snailbeach project in any way.

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I think you will find Ken Scanes is already on that group and has been for a while!

from personal contacts in Oz, it has been suggested that this is the locomotive in question http://www.australiansteam.com/sugar/baldwin45215.jpg 

it was extensively rebuilt for use on a theme park railway in the late 1970s and has been professionally maintained ever since; it is still in full operational order

it is believed to be the only operational Baldwin 4-6-0 in the Southern Hemisphere

there is also a fully operational 0-4-2ST in Oz

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Yuk! is all I can say to that!

I would say, it is a working example of a rare historic locomotive doing the job it was designed for!

I can't say I much approve of the overall appearance either, but I'm a great believer in seeing things like that working rather than 'stuffed and mounted' as they so often are.

So, full marks for preserving a piece of working history, sez I



by way of comparison, look at the 19th and early 20th century photographs of Whitby Abbey. Compare the modern 'manicured' appearance with the 'romantic ruin' appearance to be found there until the 1950s, with cattle grazing in the nave and narrow footpaths winding between fallen blocks of masonry.

Whitby Abbey is a particular example, because it was extensively photographed, but it is a typical example. Tintern also comes to mind.

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from personal contacts in Oz, it has been suggested that this is the locomotive in question http://www.australiansteam.com/sugar/baldwin45215.jpg 

it was extensively rebuilt for use on a theme park railway in the late 1970s and has been professionally maintained ever since; it is still in full operational order

it is believed to be the only operational Baldwin 4-6-0 in the Southern Hemisphere

With respect, if has been down south since 1970, it can't be the one that Wayne & Co (i.e. the Snailbeach Railway fantasists) supposedly brought to the UK!

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my reading of the published material, and I have no other source of information, is that the Snailbeach 'group' ( for want of a better description ) claimed to be purchasing this locomotive at a time when it was in SE Asia receiving a major overhaul, related to its ongoing use in the theme park.

I have never seen any actual claim that they brought it to the UK, although I may have simply missed this. It is stated in some sources that the loco was restored and sold to a third party, by my Australian contact informs me that it was simply refurbished and returned to its owners at the theme park for further duty.

I wonder if there is some further confusion with the Baldwins imported from India. If I understand matters
correctly, two Baldwin 4-6-0s were imported over a period of time from Indian sugar cane lines; these were initially identified by the nnames 'Lion' and 'Tiger' but have subsequently morphed into the locos now to be seen at the WHR and LBLR under the numbers 778 and 590, although I could be wrong.

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I was referring to the current appearence the theme park makeover had given it, not the fact it was working! I agree with you, far better to see a loco working rather than stuffed and mounted in a pristine condtion that is totally out of character.

I have never seen any actual claim that they brought it [the Baldwin] to the UK, although I may have simply missed this.

This was on the National Preservation discussion group, we had regular updates from Wayne. It's left Asia, it's en route, it's arrived in the UK, it's been whisked away to private storage, no, no one can see it, no there are no photographs of it. It was about this time that one or two people began to doubt the veracity of the scheme; up until then it all seemed plausible and quite exiting.

The discussion on Nat Pres was removed following threats by Wayne to sue for libel the owner of the discussion group, the posters on the discussion group, and anybody else who happened to be passing at the time. With hindsight it is doubtful if the threat was realistic, but I cannot criticise the owner of the discussion group for thinking, "I don't need this agro", removing the thread and banning any mention of the word Snailbeach.

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ok fair enough, I'm not on the Nat Pres forum so I missed that little gem.

suffice to say that from my contacts in Oz, the only Baldwin 4-6-0 known to have been rebuilt in the SoPac region recent years, is that one.


There is a little 0-4-2ST in Oz, restored in recent years, which is a nice little thing but outside the present scope

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I hope you don't mind me reviving this thread - but I am doing so because I had found it a while back when doing to some research in May when I visited the line in the vicinity of the mine twice and took many photos.

This morning I was on a narrow gauge railway group and someone posted a photo of the loco. One or two comments were made about the proposed restoration and the moderators decided that they didn't want the discussion going in that direction.

Now I am one of those people who get very intrigued by people shutting down an apparently innocent line of discussion and wonder what is behind it.

Anyway I am posting below a thread I have just posted also to the RailForum group and rather than rewrite it will post it below - hence the link back to Adit Now.

Earlier today I became involved in a thread on another group concerning the defunct Snailbeach District Railway in Shropshire. However, the moderators of the group found an urgent need to shut down the thread of the conversation which was drifting towards a restoration plan from the 2000s.
In May this year I visited the area around Snailbeach Mine where a lot of the track is still in place.

My photos can be found here by the way:
https://www.jhluxton.com/Railways-and-Tramways/Railway-Remains-and-Relics/Snailbeach-District-Railways/ 

I had also made a previous very quick visit a few years earlier. At the time I found some information on Wikipedia and that satisfied my curiosity.

However, in 2020, 4 years on from my initial visit read the recent highly detailed history published in 2017 by Twelveheads Press. Only then did I realise that the original SDR company apparently still exists

The foreword to the book is written by the current Chairman of the Snailbeach District Railways M.J.L. Igludden. The railway has been closed since 1959 but the company has never been dissolved by Act of Parliament thus still legally exists.

Interestingly Mr Igludden’s father acquired the railway from W.H. Austen – the business partner of the late light railway king Colonel Fred Stephens. The SDR had been one of the Colonel’s railways.

The last acts of the company apparently was to sell off land in the 1980s.

Out of curiosity I did some more googling and visited Companies House web site.

However, I could not find any trace of the original company but did find a new company inaugurated in 2006. But the directors have never included a Mr Igludden.
After a bit more googling I found a reference on a Liberal Democrat blog - Liberal England Blog
http://liberalengland.blogspot.com/2008/08/great-snailbeach-railway-mystery.html 

Reading this it became clear that about 12 years ago there was a proposal to re-open the railway as a tourist attraction. If you read the links it seemed to get bogged down in acrimony / doubts by some enthusiasts and even threats of legal action – there was even suggestion that the originators of the company from Switzerland were killed in a car crash. The original directors of the company are shown on Companies House web site as being from Zurich.
However, this debate over the restoration of the railway became heated which resulted in a Yahoo Snailbeach Oversight Group being formed by doubters. This Yahoo Group now appears defunct.

However, Google has some archive discussion on the old uk.railway news group:
https://groups.google.com/forum/# !topic/uk.railway/1cBjpDcJ7wI
I also found a thread on the mining history group Adit Now:
Adit Now:
https://www.aditnow.co.uk/community/viewtopic.aspx?t=4702 
http://sdrailway.com/  - last updated 2009
http://the.snailbeach.com/  - last updated 2012.

I would like and explanation as to why this subject has become so controversial and why today myself and a couple of other people were warned off from discussing it.
I hope this isn’t going to stir up a can of worms here on Railforums – I would just like to know – by private message if necessary - what is or was going on and why discussion of it should be silenced.

Thanks

John

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John,

The project seemed to stop when the Swiss investors were killed but there is no concrete evidence of that ? There is a lot local opposition to projects that encourage tourism around there.

As you have observed several houses have been built on the line of the railway. The line also goes into buxton quarry and to crows nest .

The plans were not detailed but it was centred around the callow hill quarries.

We worked for a long time with the residents to provide controlled access to the underground and arranged access to the buildings outside arranged open days

mike

Thanks for info Mike.

Didn't realise there was opposition to tourism in the area. Most places appear to like or at least tolerate it for the extra money it brings to the local economy.

John

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Funny people in Snailbeach.
Some of them have three eyes...

This morning I was on a narrow gauge railway group and someone posted a photo of the loco. One or two comments were made about the proposed restoration and the moderators decided that they didn't want the discussion going in that direction.

No, we didn't because:

A. It always ends badly.
B. Some group members were themselves affected by threats of litigation and dealings with their employers.
C. I am still very wary of discussing anything further in any public area, as people concerned with that project give the impression of being abiding vexatious litigants.
D. There is enough information on that group to answer any outstanding questions.
E. As I also said in that thread the Admin team use a light touch, perhaps too light a touch.
F. In the light of experience when that subject has cropped up there, no question on that subject can be regarded as innocent.

I hope that puts a little flesh on the bones of why the Admin Team politely requested three times that the subject was not for discussion there.

This morning I was on a narrow gauge railway group and someone posted a photo of the loco. One or two comments were made about the proposed restoration and the moderators decided that they didn't want the discussion going in that direction.

D. There is enough information on that group to answer any outstanding questions.
E. As I also said in that thread the Admin team use a light touch, perhaps too light a touch.
F. In the light of experience when that subject has cropped up there, no question on that subject can be regarded as innocent.

Hi

You exist here too :)

Thanks for clarifying things more and I have had a bit more info from elsewhere - but I think you should understand I became more curious due to the "cloak and dagger" response.
An explanation of what went on might have been different from starting up the debate of whether it was a viable project which I can see now was obviously waged at the time.

I was aware that something had gone on from my on line research which I did stumble on quite by chance around the time I visited the site.

There was absolutely no intention to stir things up. I was only trying to find out more. Who isn't curious about railway and industrial history matters especially if things have a cloak of secrecy around them?

You state there is enough info on the group to answer questions all I could find were one or two other recent threads including one I started some weeks ago is there something else buried that the search facility doesn't show up?

John

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Hi

You exist here too :)

I do indeed. Usually to be found asking about the Blaenau area.

Thanks for clarifying things more and I have had a bit more info from elsewhere - but I think you should understand I became more curious due to the "cloak and dagger" response.
An explanation of what went on might have been different from starting up the debate of whether it was a viable project which I can see now was obviously waged at the time.

I was aware that something had gone on from my on line research which I did stumble on quite by chance around the time I visited the site.

There was absolutely no intention to stir things up. I was only trying to find out more. Who isn't curious about railway and industrial history matters especially if things have a cloak of secrecy around them.

I'm sure - but the group were asked politely to drop the subject. Several times. Carrying on, and carrying on elsewhere would be seen by many as a bit cheeky. However, on here I am but a member and have no legal stance whatsoever on the information revealed such as it may be.

You state there is enough info on the group to answer questions all I could find were one or two other recent threads including one I started some weeks ago is there something else buried that the search facility doesn't show up?

John

Within a reasonably defined legal framework that does not impact upon the Admin Team there, all the answers that you are ever likely to need are on that very group. There may not be the detail you want, but I'm sure there are enough clues to point you in the right direction.

It was a deeply unpleasant time for several people, some of whom are friends of mine, and I hope you will see that public discussion isn't the best plan. Well - at least on that group, I cannot speak for here and nor do I intend to.

There are Mid Walians as well! 8-)8-)