Historic loco steams in for visit to Blists Hill Victorian town
A train built for use in Sierra Leone in the 1950's and purchased by the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway will be on show in one of the Ironbridge Gorge Museums until August 25.
The Hunslet 2-6-2T locomotive No. 85, lwhich last ran on the mid-Wales heritage railway in 2010, has spent six years on display at the Locomotion Museum in Shildon, an outpost of the National Railway Museum.
The train has toured the country, and is now on display in the Blists Hill Victorian Museum.
The grand tour of UK heritage sites, funded by a £22,800 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, celebrates the many links between the UK and Sierra Leone.
The Tour has been organised by the Welshpool and Llanfair Railway and is helping to promote the Sierra Leone National Railway Museum and to raise funds for the building of a new workshop at the Llanfair Caereinion base.
It is intended that No. 85 will be the first locomotive to be restored in the new facility. When restored the loco will be able to form the African Train, running with two Gloucester-built Sierra Leone Railways bogie carriages that the railway also purchased in 1975.
At the end of its stay at Blists Hill Victorian Town, No. 85 will travel to the Shrewsbury Steam Rally on August 27 and 28 before a triumphant return to the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway a week later as part of the line’s annual Steam Gala on September 1 and 3.
