MY LIFE IN TRAINS
My Story - Part Twenty Seven
Lydney
Towards the end of my first university summer holiday I went to Lydney, at the southern edge of the Forest of Dean on the Severn Estuary, to start my first solo geological mapping. This would form an important part of my degree work.
Luckily for all of you, I didn’t go to my first chosen location, the Isle of Raasay, between Skye and the Scottish mainland, as nobody replied to my letters about accommodation. Lucky because there were no railways remaining on Raasay, but the main line from Gloucester to Severn Tunnel Junction runs through Lydney. When I wasn’t out walking the forests and fields to the north of Lydney, I gave myself some time by the lineside. I thoroughly explored the line to the east of Lydney, where it runs to the foreshore of the estuary as far as the truncated Severn Bridge.
All Photographs by Alan Lewis Chambers ©
GWR 5700 0-6-0PT No 3775 heads east out of Lydney on 23 August 1963.
One of the earliest batch of BR 9F 2-10-0's, No 92004 powers a mineral freight east of Lydney on 23 August 1963.
BR 9F 2-10-0 92225 leans to the curve with a freight for the west as it approaches Lydney on 23 August 1963.
GWR 5700 0-6-0PT No 9609 heads west alongside the Severn Estuary towards Lydney on 23 August 1963.
GWR 2-6-0 No 7317 heads west alongside the Severn Estuary towards Lydney on 23 August 1963.
GWR Modified Hall 4-6-0 No 7900 'Saint Peter's Hall' heads a freight east of Lydney towards Gloucester on 23 August 1963.
BR 9F 2-10-0 No 92244 heads a train of ironstone for the South Wales furnaces towards Lydney on 23 August 1963.
GWR 2884 2-8-0 No 3836 hauls ironstone empties east of Lydney towards Gloucester on 23 August 1963.
GWR Modified Hall 4-6-0 No 6986 'Rydal Hall' heads west towards Lydney on 27 August 1963.
GWR 2-6-0 No 6338 passes under the closed Severn Bridge line heading east from Lydney on 27 August 1963.
BR 9F 2-10-0 No 92243 speeds west towards Lydney on 27 August 1963.
LMSR 8F 2-8-0 No 48367 heads a westbound freight beside the Severn Estuary near the truncated railway bridge on 27 August 1963.
GWR 5700 0-6-0PT No 3775 runs alongside the Severn heading towards Wales on 27 August 1963.
East of Lydney with the Severn Estuary and the truncated Severn Bridge in the background, BR 9F 2-10-0 No 92228 heads west
on 27 August 1963 with a mineral train.
