It is one of my regrets that I didn’t experience rural branch lines in steam days. I grew up in 1950s East London and by the time that I was old enough – and had enough money to travel further afield – Beeching’s axe had fallen and steam was almost gone.
From the age of eight or nine, I began to explore my locality with my friends. If we had no money, we would walk to Carter Road bridge, about ¼ mile east of Upton Park station, where we could stand on a bomb site next to the London Tilbury & Southend and District lines. Both had two tracks and were quite busy.
The District Line had six-car sets of red Q or R Stock, including a few silver R Stock sets with a red waistband and speed whiskers. Most sets comprised eight cars at peak times when six-car sets of Metropolitan CO/CP stock would also appear.
The LTS line had a variety of LMS/BR 2-6-4Ts hauling non-gangwayed stock to and from Fenchurch Street, mostly eightcoach sets from Southend or four-coach sets from Tilbury. The stock was in
