Fragments of the history of the 0-6-6-0 compound Mallets built for the Yaroslavl-Vologda-Arkhangelsk Railway of Northern Russia are scattered among fifteen or twenty books, atlases, and magazines. It is the intention of this article to draw such material together and present as coherent a story as is possible at this distance in time.
The well established Moscow-Yaroslavl Railway, at that time a private company, first extended its line northwards as far as Vologda in 1877. The territory was sparsely populated and the line was built cheaply on the 3ft 6ins/1067mm gauge. Commencing at the settlement of Uroch on the north bank of the River Volga opposite Yaroslavl, the new line was 203kms long and was connected to the main line only by ferry - the Volga is nearly a kilometre wide at this point and a bridge could not be justified. The original motive power consisted of twenty-one moderately sized 0-6-0s from Manning Wardle (no.1-12), Kitson (no.13-18), Borsig (no.19-20), and Kolomna (no.21). They sufficed for the next 20 years.
In 1894 it was decided to extend the narrow gauge due northwards 633kms throught the peatlands and forests to Arkhangelsk on the White Sea. Arkhangelsk had been established as a port as far back as 1580 but its usefulness was hampered by sheer isolation. The extension was opened in 1897, by which time the Yaroslavl Company had been gathered into the State Railway system. There was now a narrow gauge route of 837kms, and this was to remain the longest 1067mm line in Russia until the Soviet Union gained control of the whole of Sakhalin Island from
