The morning after yesterday's shot and 'Mayflower' and it's support coach leave York in beautiful sunshine on it's way back to it's base.
I remember many of these locomotives at work in the Doncaster area during the 1960's. At that time they were painted black and had a thick layer of grime on them. There were also two of these locomotives at Sheffield in use as carriage heaters - at that time many coaches were still steam heated.
Some 410 examples were built, with construction starting in 1942. The appearance of the first example coincided with a visit to Britain by the Prime Minister of South Africa, Field Marshal Jan Smuts, and it was named Springbok in his honour. The first 40 were named mainly after breeds of antelope. Most of the rest were unnamed, with a few exceptions. This example was originally unnamed, but when preserved it took the name of one of its classmates that had been scrapped.
How is the lovely Katharine doing now?
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Thank you all for your lovely comments and favs, which put this shot on the Popular Page.
I was pleased to get some shots of this locomotive, the first digital images I have of it during preservation.
There is another steam special in York on Thursday 28th November, so hopefully I will be able to get photos of that.
Ian