Description
The story of Hudswell Clarke locomotive 1238 of 1916, from her order being placed in September 1915, construction in Leeds during 1916, and her shipment and use in Africa at the Ashanti Goldfields Corporation in Ghana. She is of the same type as 55 similar locomotives supplied through agents Robert Hudson Ltd which were used in France during WW1, and these are covered in the text, along with known survivors. The connection between Hudswell Clarke and Robert Hudson Ltd is also covered, as well as some of the other standard narrow gauge locomotive types seen in the Robert Hudson Catalogues of the period. 1238 herself came to grief in a tropical rainstorm 1948, killing her driver and ending up upside down at the bottom of a banking on the edge of an African swamp. Lost for the following 48 years, she was rediscovered in 1996, still in the swamp, by mining engineer Colin Laidler, who recovered her and pieced her back together. Suffering from a disease contracted in the African Bush, Colin was invalided back to the UK, followed in 2008 by the locomotive herself. The story concludes with progress on her restoration to steam between 2010 and 2014, when she entered service at the Apedale Valley Light Railway in Staffordshire. She has visited various other railways since then, and can sometimes be seen wearing the War Department number 104 in deference to the locomotive originally allocated to the Ashanti order in 1915 and which was diverted to France in 1916.
A4 format, soft bound, with 82 pages, including over 89 colour photographs and 11 B&W photographs, many taken during the restoration.
Includes a general arrangement drawings, and several line drawings. Published in 2014
