Highland 4-4-0 Locomotives in Great_Britain

Class C (Small Ben) / 2P (Locobase 8917)

Data from The Evolution of the Steam Locomotive (1803 to 1898) By George Augustus Nokes Published 1899 The Railway Publishing Co and H. A Vallance, The Highland Railway (Newton Abbott, 1963, 1969), pp. 134-136. Dubs & Company works numbers were 3685-3692 in 1897-1898. Lochgorn Works added nine in 1899-1900, and North British works numbers were 17398-17400 in 1906.

Peter Drummond design that introduced inside cylinders for a very clean look. According to Vallance, they greatly resembled Caledonian engines designed by Drummond's brother Dugald. Of note at the time was the placing of the cylinders inside the frame and valve inside them (i.e. closer to the centerline).

All had mountain names beginning with Ben. They operated north of Inverness and on to Keith, heading up Aberdeen trains of the time.

North British followed up this design with six more equipped with bigger boilers; see Locobase 8918.

As for the Small Bens, all were taken into the LMS when it was formed in 1923. In 1948, the surviving 11 Bens were all of the small variety. British Railways scrapped 3 of them, leaving 8 to carry on into the 1950s.

Class E Bruce / 1P (Locobase 10322)

Data from "'Sutherland' Class Engines, Highland Ry," The Locomotive Magazine, Vol VIII (16 May 1903), p. 343

These were similar to the earlier "Sutherlands"(Locobase 2569), but had a smaller boiler and a larger grate. The new design also increased the boiler pressure. The E class may have been the only locomotive produced under this nameplate (works numbers 1-8) as the works (Springburn, Glasgow) were bought in 1888 by Sharp, Stewart as part of their move from Manchester.

All were nominally passed along to the LMS at Grouping in 1923, but only the Fife (later Drum - is that cute or what?) actually bore its LMS number, which was 14278.

Class F Sutherland (Locobase 2569)

Data from HA Vallance (4th ed., with Climber & Lambert, 1985). See also "Four-Coupled Locomotive for the Highland Railway", Engineering, Volume 20 (23 July 1875), pp. 71-72.

David Jones's series of 4-4-0s, which ended with the celebrated "Skye Bogies" began with this equally competent design. The profile shows a double frame, straight boiler, narrow firebox, steam dome just ahead of the first driver set, slightly inclined outside cylinders between the axles of a long leading truck, and the curious louvered stack. The louvres, says Hollingsworth (1982), were designed to aid the draft over the fire as well as to lift the exhaust above the driver's line of sight.

Vallance says that after the initial 10 were delivered by Dubs in 1874, the railroad's Inverness (Lochgorm) works added 7 more between 1876 & 1888. "Athough somewhat handicapped by their small tenders, these engines performed a vast amount of useful work," says Vallance.

Class L (Skye Bogies) / 1P (Locobase 679)

These engines had smaller drivers than those of David Jones's Scottish mainline 4-4-0s, but were otherwise similar. They were built to travel over a steeply graded Dingwall and Skye Railway in northern Scotland. In many ways, they are regarded as the ultimate expression of the "Allan-Crewe" type, having the external frame, slightly sloped cylinders, and excellent riding qualities. Later engines differed in details with the last being built in 1901.

Class Loch / 2P (Locobase 2261)

Data from "Express Engines-Highland Railway," The Engineer (8 July 1898).

Peter Drummond design that carried the basic Skye Bogie layout to the end of the century. (HA Vallance (4th ed., 1985) credits the design to David Jones.)

Glover (1967) observes that the last of the class came out in 1917, which given the change in fashion to inside-cylinder engines, testifies to their basic excellence. While they were indeed good engines, it needs to be noted that the first 15 went into service during a 3-month period in 1896. Their relatively low axle loading and loading gauge suited them to the Kyle line that served the west coast of Scotland in World War I.

Such was the demand for such engines that North British produced three more in 1917; see Locobase 14408.

Class Loch/2P - 1917 (Locobase 14408)

Data from Highland history and culture site at [], a digital image of an LMS-prepared locomotive diagram.

As noted in Locobase 2261, the Highland's wartime traffic levels warranted an increase in small Eight-wheelers and the Loch design was the basis for this three-locomotive order. They were not duplicates as the boilers grew to take 35 more small tubes. Their names were Loch Ashie, Loch Garve, and Loch Ruthven.

According to Am Baile, "These last three engines were needed primarily for the increased traffic on the Kyle line where they were the heaviest locomotives permitted. During WWI they pulled a lot of traffic, particularly US supplies that arrived on the west coast, from Kyle to Invergordon."

All three had been withdrawn prior to the LMS's nationalization in 1948.

Class O (Locobase 10667)

Data from "Tank Engines, Highland Ry", The Locomotive Magazine, Vol XIV (15 September 1908), p. 155.

Originally delivered in 1878-1879 as 2-4-0Ts for shunting (switching) in the Inverness and Perth railyards, these engines had inside bearings on the leading wheels and the crosshead and rod running in a slot in the subsidiary frame.

The class soon branched out to Aberfeldy where working the mixed-traffic trains exposed the design's tendency to unsteadiness and to a hotboxes on the leading axle. So David Jones substituted a bogie for the leading axle on then #17 Breadalbane, which cured the problem. Burghead (58) was soon treated similarly and set to work on the Burghead branch as was as Highlander (59), which hauled trains on the Keith and Buckie section.

By the time of the 1908 report, the trio were back at their original posts.

Class P (Yankee Tanks) (Locobase 3775)

Ian McDonnell, writing for Bryan Attewell ([] Steam locomotive simulator (April 2000 edition), gives us a history that emphasizes the ubiquity of steam locomotion in the late 19th century. The first two engines had been intended for South America to be operated by the Uruguay Great Eastern. When UGE defaulted, the Highland accepted them on trial to see if they'd be suitable for branch-line operations.

Success in the trials resulted in 3 more that were somewhat more powerful for the Invergarry-Fort Augustus branch. One contemporary account described this trio as "...exceptionally smart and quick running engines." They soon proved their worth (1,200 miles a week for #52 without a break) and could be found on many branch lines for decades until their retirement in the 1930s. (The last one left in 1934.)

McDonnell's explanation for the class name: "As they had been ordered for South America, they were known as 'Yankee Tanks.' I suppose that if you lived in Scotland in the 19th Century, the difference between North and South America was not something you knew or cared about."

Class Snaigow (Locobase 2327)

Data from TITLE

Diagram of Highland Railway 4-4-0 passenger locomotive No.73 "Snaigow"

EXTERNAL ID

GB232_D501_26

DATE OF IMAGE

1916

PERIOD

1910s

CREATOR (AV)

The Highland Railway

SOURCE

Highland Archive Centre

ASSET ID

8127

on Ambail highland history & culture website at [], last accessed 7 June 2020. See also Ahrons (1927); and "Four-Coupled Bogie Express Locomotive, Highland Railway", Volume XXVI [26] (15 December 1920,), pp.260-261.

These Christopher Cumming engines were "all-outside" showing both cylinders and valve gear outside the frame. Unusually for a 4-4-0 in the United Kingdom, actuated their valves with Walschaerts's outside constant-lead radial valve gear. The two names--Snaigow and Durn-- represented the residences of company directors W H Cox and A E Pullar.

Other typical Cumming features were the Belpaire firebox and the use of a Robinson superheater. The latter meant the cylinders were served their steam through 10" (254 mm) piston valves. The two were relatively light and small boilered among the British 4-4-0s of the time. Their operational area ran from Inverness north to the terminus at Wick, along which they hauled mail and heavy passenger trains.

When introduced, the pair had their boilers set at 160 psi (11 bar), which yielded a calculated tractive effort of 18,860 lb (8,554 kg or 83.89 kN). The increase to 175 psi came in 1922.

Taken into the London, Midland & Scottish (LMS) at Grouping in 1923, the two remained in service until 1935 (Durn) and 1936 (Snaigow).

Class Strath / 1P (Locobase 10264)

Data from "Express Engines-Highland Railway," The Engineer (8 July 1898). See also "Four-Coupled Bogie Passenger Engines, Highland Ry," The Locomotive Magazine, Vol VIII (31 Jan 1903), p.84. Works numbers 4428-4439.

These Eight-wheelers designed by David Jones worked on the northern sections of the HR's hilly main line, which had one 1 in 70 stretch (0.75%) that ran almost 8 miles (12.9 km). Like many of his locomotives, the Straths had the louvered stack (chimney, funnel) that improved draft. The cab had rounded corners and contained combination injectors, tablet exchanging apparatus (for train control), and passenger communications.

Although all 12 were still operating at the time the Highland was taken into the LMS in 1923's Grouping, only 6 were given LMS numbers and these were scrapped by the early 1930s.

Class U (Large Ben) / 2P (Locobase 8918)

Data from Railway Engineer, August 1908. See also Charles S Lake "Locomotive Notes - New Express Locomotives for the Highland Railway," Model Engineer and Electrician, Volume (16 July 1908), p. 53; and "The Highland Railway and Its Locomotives", Locomotive Magazine, Volume XXV [25] (15 March 1919), p. 37. Works numbers were 18269-18272 in 1908, 18803-18804 in 1909.

North British had supplied the majority of "Small Ben" engines (Locobase 8917) in 1897 (8 produced by an NBL predecessor, Dubs & Co) and 3 more in 1906. In 1908 the company came back with four more locomotives with a much larger boiler pressed to a slightly higher level. Immediately dubbed "Large Bens" or "Big Bens" in comparison to the "Small Bens", they offered no more power but had greater steaming capability.

F G Smith designed a feed water heater that he tested in Big Bens in 1914-1915. According to the 1919 LM article, it used two stages of heater. The first stage passed water from the tender through a check valve into a box located on the right hand side of the smokebox. A "nest" of small tubes bathed in the exhaust steam of the cylinders before leaving through the stack. The preheated water now exited through a second check valve and flowed into a second component, a "flat case" placed in front of the smokebox tubeplate. This contained tubes that took the hot gases from the boiler tubes and used them to further heat the water.

LM wrote that the setup meant that there was always heated water available for the boiler, scale and other deposits would remain in the box, and that the water's temperature would naturally increase with greater demand. But like most such initiatives, the setup came to be seen as not worth the effort to keep the devices in service and the difficulty in getting at the boiler tubes. The feed water heaters were removed and, LM said, the engines' appearances had "suffered by the removal of these somewhat unsightly adjuncts.

As delivered, the two that followed in 1909 were numbered 66 & 68,but by 1909, they had swapped numbers with two 0-6-4Ts, thus smoothing out the numeration.

Wikipedia's Highland Railways entry suspects that all 26 Small and Large Bens were taken into the LMS when it was formed in 1923. At the time of Nationalization in 1948, eleven survived to take British Railways numbering. None of them were Large Bens, which were retired in 1932-1937.