LMS Milk
I ran an overview of milk traffic on the LMS, from Nationalisation to BR days in "LMS Journal" (Issue No 34). It's quite a subject with a lot of potential for modellers. Unfortunately, it wasn't what I submitted - a draft that I shared with the Editor while fixing errors and adding more material was run instead. Below is a link to what should have been published:
LMS milk (6-page pdf file)
New addition - This marvellous picture shows "Jubilee" No 5569 Tasmania moving away from Basford Hall Jc near Crewe (thanks to Philip Millard) with an Up parcels train, containing milk tanks near the head. Both 4w and 6w types can be seen, before the former were converted from 4w>6w.
In between is a SR 4w CCT which would have been in a long distance inter-company roster. Further back the stock is harder to identify but ex-LNWR bogie vans are evident, the leading one with an arc roof.
The date is unknown although this "Jubilee" was built in August 1934 and with a 50:50 mixture of 4w and 6w milk tanks in the train, the likely date may best be described as c1935. The greater puzzle concerns the actual working because the more distant milk traffic ran overnight yet a solar calculator at this spot gives a time of around 6pm. A useful source is the 1934(s) Passenger Train Marshalling Arrangements but while Parcels Trains are shown, dedicated milk tank trains were not. The only (partially) relevant working that I could find was an overnight sleeping car train from Carlisle to Euston which carried 4 vans for milk churns, from Dumfries to Queens Park, and would have passed here around 5am. Any comments on the train in the photo would be welcome!
A final comment would be that b&w image cannot show the colours in this scene, which were: a crimson lake loco, mucky milk tanks, a green van, and more crimson lake vehicles towards the rear. Photo: Real Photographs
Click on the image for an enlargement
Related LMS topics and passenger train formations are here:
