Cape Midland Branches (3): The Grahamstown & Port Alfred branch, by Bruno Martin, Bruce Brinkman & Charlie Lewis
Please note: All photographs, maps and text in Soul of A Railway are protected by copyright and may not be copied or reproduced in any way for further use without prior permission in writing from the authors.
1. This haunting exposure of the approach to the New Year's tunnel c 1896 by CGR's official photographer, E H Short, sets the tone for one of SAR's most atmospheric branch lines.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We are indebted to the following for crucial input and support by way of photographs, captions, historical information, anecdotes, proof-reading and corrections (alphabetical order):
Eugene Armer, Bruce Brinkman, Alan Buttrum, Eric Conradie, Andrew Deacon, Allen Duff, Johannes Haarhoff,*Geoff Hall, Victor Hand, John Hunt, Allen Jorgensen, Bob Koch, Charlie Lewis, Robert Maidment-Wilson, Dick Manton, Bruno Martin, Dennis Moore, Yolanda Meyer, Leith Paxton, Les Pivnic, Peter Stow, Mike Swift.
*Johannes is the founder and instigator of the DRISA project at the Transnet Heritage Library. Its aim is to digitise the quarter-million odd negatives and prints of incalculable historical importance as well as the posting and indexing of the various magazines published by the railways' publicity departments over the years, beginning with the Cape Government Railways. This service is a rich vein of source material - see photos 1, 52, 73, 67, 68, 79-84 inclusive, 96, 106, 132 & 133.
ALICEDALE JUNCTION – GRAHAMSTOWN RAILWAY
Researched and compiled by Bruno Martin
When the citizens of Grahamstown first lobbied for a railway in 1856 they had asked for a direct line to Port Elizabeth but instead, under Cape Act 19 of 1874, Grahamstown was to be served with a branch line linked the Cape Midland Line at Alicedale Junction. Not happy with the decision, S C Cronwright, MP for Grahamstown, presented the Legislative Council with a petition with 1 334 signatures requesting Grahamstown be included on the main line – but to no avail. After the main line had reached Alicedale Junction in May 1877, work started on the Grahamstown branch. The first section, 22 miles 17 chains long, was opened to Atherstone on 3 March 1879 while the next section, comprising 12 miles and 66 chains, was opened six months later to Grahamstown on 3 September.
There was no official welcome on the evening of 2 September for the first passenger train arriving at Grahamstown Station from Port Elizabeth carrying some important guests for the formal opening the next day. The following morning “a well-dressed, expectant and hospitably-disposed crowd” assembled at the station to witness the departure of the first train at 11:00 am from Grahamstown Station for the ceremonial journey to Atherstone. After arriving at Atherstone, the passengers were left to mark time while waiting for the 16-carriage special train from Port Elizabeth which was running 1½ hours behind schedule. For the journey to Grahamstown, the combined train now made up of 25 carriages was doubled-headed with the leading engine “gorgeously emblazoned” and bearing the name ‘The Settler City’ and the consist banked by a third engine. The platform at Grahamstown Station was packed to capacity with spectators as the train rolled in and came to a stop. Passengers on the train were unable to get off for about 20 minutes and then they still had to push their way through the crowd with their luggage.
The opening ceremony followed the established pattern of speeches of a political flavour and full of praise for the chief engineer Mr Watson and his team. The formalities culminated with three cheers “for the success and prosperity of the line”.
Building the branch line to Grahamstown through the difficult terrain was no mean achievement which called for considerable professional skill from the district engineer W J Rose. It required boring three short tunnels – more than on any other line in the Cape Colony embodied at the time – the longest was the 787ft Waai Nek tunnel*. One major cutting involved the blasting and removal of 17 000 cubic yards of hard white rock. A bridge composed of loose rock was built over a deep ravine while on another stretch a 70 ft high embankment was required. On exiting the 300-ft long New Year’s River Tunnel, two miles from Alicedale Junction, the line encountered a sustained 1 in 40 grade for 11 miles to Highlands. The line reached its highest point 2 500 feet above sea level between Tunnel No.2 and Cold Spring from where it descended 750 feet over 7½ miles into Grahamstown.
* George Pauling’s first contract: to supervise the work in the tunnel and on each side of it.
THE KOWIE RAILWAY COMPANY
Grahamstown was not intended to be the end of the line for long: the business community now focussed on enhancing the commercial prospects of the city by extending the railway to Port Alfred. Residents of Lower Albany had petitioned the Cape Colonial Government as early as 1862 for a railway between Grahamstown and Port Alfred. About £200 000 was spent by the Cape Colonial Government to establish a harbour at the mouth of the Kowie River. This work was abandoned in 1898 and the harbour was left to silt up.
George Pauling, who went on to make a name for himself building railways in Southern and Central Africa and other parts of the world, arrived in Grahamstown in 1877 where he established various business ventures as a hotelier, builder and contractor. Pauling records he was “on terms of intimate friendship” with Mr Cronwright, MP for Grahamstown and that he suggested to him if the government could be induced to grant a subsidy of £2 000 per mile for building the railway from Grahamstown to Port Alfred he might be able to raise the rest of the capital needed in England. An announcement was made on 23 July 1880 that the railway was to be constructed by private enterprise with a subsidy of £50 000 provided by the Cape Colonial Government. The route was surveyed between September 1880 and March 1881 and on 16 May, the bill authorising the construction of the railway was passed by the Cape Parliament as Act No.5 of 1881. Pauling teamed up with one of his business acquaintances, Ralph Firbank, to form the company Firbank & Pauling and was awarded the contract to build the railway. Of a total estimated cost of £350 000 for the 43 miles and 34 chains of railway, Pauling had to raise £300 000 in England. The Grahamstown and Port Alfred Railway Company Ltd was floated in England with a capital of £200 000 from mainly British shareholders. On 21 October 1881, John X Merriman, Commissioner of Public Works, performed the turning of the first sod ceremony in Port Alfred.
By February 1882, earthworks were completed for 14 miles and ready for track laying. Rails had been shipped out from England but the inability to land the railway material due to bad weather and the breakdown of the tug seriously hampered the progress. The company ordered four tank locomotives from the Hunslet Engine Co. Ltd of Leeds; two of which were landed from the ‘SS Rothesay’ at Port Alfred on 22 May 1882. The passenger locomotives with a 4-4-0 wheel arrangement and weighing 22 tons in full working order were named ‘Bathurst’ and ‘Grahamstown’. Sporting large American-type balloon stacks, they were designed for wood-firing as imported coal from Wales was considered too expensive. The goods locomotives were named ‘Kowie’ and ‘Port Alfred’ and had an 0-6-0 wheel arrangement.
The first train is reported to have operated on a 2-mile long stretch of the line on 27 July 1882. By May 1883, the line was in operation several miles beyond Bathurst and it was anticipated that the whole line would be opened throughout by the end of 1883. About 6 per cent of the line was graded at 1 in 40 while 30 per cent was graded at 1 in 50 and curves of 8 chains minimum radius.
Crossing the deep gorge of Blaauwkrantz River was the main obstacle in the way of completing the line. Local Africans believed demons and ghosts inhabited the forbidding gorge and always insisted on waiting for a while before entering to appease the spirits. Pauling noted that “ a very bad piece of country had to be crossed and it took some time before it was decided to cross the worst spot of the route called Blaauwkrantz, about thirteen miles from Grahamstown, by a high-level bridge". The bridge was designed by civil engineers Max Am Ende and A Buchanan, the superstructure supplied by Messrs A Handyside & Co., Derby, England. The components of the bridge were shipped to Port Alfred and transported to the site by the railway which in the meantime had been completed up to there. Thirty-five men were engaged in erecting the bridge under the supervision of Mr Parker from Messrs Handyside & Co. The erection of the bridge was completed on 2 August 1884. It was built on the cantilever principle with a central span of 230ft, towering at its highest point 185ft above the riverbed, with two spans on either side of 61ft 3in giving an overall length of 480ft 6ins. The raking struts were 75ft long and the supporting piers were 55ft high.
When about two-thirds of the work on the railway was finished, a financial arrangement proposed by Ralph Firbank fell through and Pauling had great difficulty in raising sufficient funds to carry on with the contract. Pauling had gambled with the idea of getting the government to advance the subsidy of £1 500 per mile built but the responsible department steadfastly refused to release any money until the railway was completed. To add to Pauling’s financial woes, his business partner Ralph Firbank died suddenly from heart failure. Pauling managed to juggle payments from other contracts he had won to see out the completion of the Port Alfred-Grahamstown Railway.
To create some cash-flow, a passenger service was introduced 24 December 1883 from Port Alfred to a temporary terminus named Waai Plaatz near the Blaauwkrantz Bridge where passengers transferred to a post-cart to continue their journey to Grahamstown. Provision was made in the timetable taking effect on 4 January 1884 for a daily combined train and post-cart journey in each direction. The cost of the journey was far from being cheap: a charge £2 was made for each passenger.
On 27 August 1884, a party of officials (Messrs Cooper, the railway company’s chief engineer; Drennan, the government engineer, Hopkinson, the contractor’s engineer and Lowe, the traffic manager) travelled down the line from Belmont to the Blaauwkrantz Bridge. Here, they boarded the footplate of the waiting locomotive of a construction train which would have been the first to cross the bridge. With locomotive superintendent Begbie at the controls, the ‘Port Alfred’ proceeded across the bridge with its guests to the construction train waiting on the Port Alfred side. Ten days later, testing the bridge followed the time-honoured process of first placing two locomotives coupled together on each of the side spans, and then moved so that all four locomotives straddled the centre span, after which all four locomotives slowly hauled sixteen wagons with a total load of 300 tons over the bridge at 25 mph and lastly, all four locomotives entered the bridge at speed and brought to a sudden halt on the centre span. The results of the test were very satisfactory in all respects: the deflection and oscillation amounted to just a few thousandths of an inch.
The line was opened to traffic on 1 October 1884 but not all went to plan on the opening day: the train from Port Alfred which left at 7:00 am did not arrive in Grahamstown until 7:00 pm – a rather trying experience for a journey of a little over 43 miles. Trains initially operated from a temporary terminus ‘near the native location’ in Grahamstown until 1 December when the Kowie Railway Company’s trains were able to use the CGR station. Two passenger services initially operated daily in each direction but after five months the service was reduced to one regular train. The construction cost of the railway was never fully recovered and the Grahamstown and Port Alfred Railway Co. Ltd had “proved a sore drain on our resources” lamented Pauling.
While passenger and goods traffic looked promising at the start of operations, the volume was not sustained, and the railway company was plunged into financial difficulties. With financial resources exhausted, cabled instructions placing the Kowie Railway Company in liquidation were sent from London placing the brokers in possession of the station buildings, even seizing the manager’s household goods while the employees were left unpaid. A public notice appeared on 19 July 1887 advising no scheduled trains would be running after 20 July.
Although scheduled services had ceased, a weekly mixed train was run to convey goods landed at Port Alfred and passengers from the district who wanted to travel to Grahamstown. With the Jubilee Exhibition to be held in Grahamstown from December 1877 until January 1888, the sudden closure of the railway to Port Alfred could not have come at a worse time. As many visitors from all over South Africa were expected to visit the region, it was decided to continue running a limited service until March 1888.
Following negotiations with the liquidator, a syndicate was formed by ten residents of Grahamstown to take over the running of the railway. It was reopened on 27 October 1888 and continued operating until 1 September 1895 when a new company was formed, the Kowie Railway Company Ltd., to take over the line. A government loan of £20 000 was secured by debenture stock of which £5 000 was allocated to expenses in connection with the liquidation of the original railway company. The balance of £15 000 was ear-marked for getting the permanent way and rolling stock in good working order. The parliamentary authority obtained for the formation of the new railway company gave the Government the right to nominate two directors on the board.
The new company soldiered on until that fateful day, Saturday, 22 April 1911 when disaster struck:
The Memorial Edition of Grocott’s Penny Mail, dated 1 May 1911, carried an ‘authentic description of the appalling accident’ headlined Blaauwkrantz Bridge Disaster. Passenger Train hurled into the Valley of Death. A goods wagon on a mixed train carrying stone for Grahamstown Cathedral derailed a short distance from the bridge. It bumped along the sleepers and on reaching the centre of the bridge turned over snapping the front coupling and detaching it from the front portion of the train which continued to Grahamstown. The sudden impact of the two trailing passenger coaches against the overturned wagon sent them toppling over the side of the bridge where they were smashed to pieces on the rocks below. Twenty-eight passengers were killed and a further twenty-two were hurt, though it appears that one or two more may have subsequently succumbed to their injuries. There was one remarkable survivor: upon hearing a voice calling “Mummy”, two men climbed up one of the bridge’s 55ft high support piers to rescue a little girl found seated on a crossbeam.
At the inquiry into the accident, it was suggested that the derailed goods wagon that had caused the accident was overloaded. The magistrate, however, ruled that the derailment was due to poor maintenance of the track and rolling stock. As for the damage to the bridge – some rails were ripped up and a handrail on the south side bent. Within a few days, the bridge was repaired and declared safe to be reopened to traffic.
There can be little doubt that the Blaauwkrantz Bridge disaster was the death knell for the Kowie Railway Company. The company went into liquidation on 4 September 1912 with tenders to purchase called for both in South Africa and the United Kingdom. The sole offer of £47 500 to purchase came from the Union Government which acquired the line by a Resolution of Parliament and added it to the 8340 miles of open lines of the SAR on 1 April 1913.
POSTSCRIPT:
Unable to cope with increased loads and the use of heavier rolling stock, the Blaauwkrantz* Bridge was replaced with a new structure at a cost of £29 000. The new bridge, consisting of two 84ft, two 102ft and three 36ft spans carried on trestles standing 175ft above the river bed was built without interrupting rail traffic by interlacing the structure of the new bridge with the old and upon completion, dismantling the old and retaining only the original abutments on either side. The official opening ceremony was performed on 23 June 1928 by the mayor of Grahamstown, Clr J C Rae, MPC, in the presence of the mayors of Port Alfred and Bathurst. Heavier rolling stock could now complete the journey to Port Alfred from distant centres without passengers having to change coaches at Grahamstown.
(*Spelling of Blaauwkrantz was changed to Bloukrans in 1953).
References:
Brinkman, B., ‘The Kowie Railway’, SA Rail, Vol.39, No.4, 1999, pp.185-189
Burman, J., ‘Early railways at the Cape’, 1984
Bezuidenhout, B. The 10.20 to Grahamstown: Blaauwkrantz Railway Disaster – 22 April 1911.
Holland, D F., ‘Steam Locomotives of the South African Railways’, Vol. 1: 1859-1910, 1971, pp.80-83.
Hunt, K S., ‘When the Railway came to Grahamstown’, CONTREE, No.?, pp.24-28.
Hunt, K S., ‘The Blaauwkrantz Bridge’, 1979, CONTREE, No.5, pp.27-32.
Turpin, E W., ‘Basket Work Harbour: the story of the Kowie’, 1964
Pauling, G., 'The Chronicles of a contractor', 1969 (reprint)
South African Railway Magazine, ‘The Kowie Railway’, May 1913, pp.563-567.
2. It seems appropriate to start in Alicedale because the railway reached Grahamstown from this end first, in September 1879. GD 2229 was coming off shed for 551-down, the 13:20 to Grahamstown, in March 1961.
3. Coupled up, waiting for the 'Right away driver!'. Beyond #2229's front tank you can see the moving-structure gauge for the branch, an essential measuring device for this line with its three abnormally tight tunnels.
4. In the train's consist was this dowdy 3rd-class vehicle marked 'Skoliere Alleenlik' [=Scholars Only]. Along the way I noticed it was well patronised and not by schoolchildren 'alleenlik'.
Peter Stow, our coach fundi has provided details (Peter was in charge of all coaching stock on Transnet until he retired two years ago):
"Coach 3117 was one of six Native coaches numbered 3114 to 3119 of type J-12 built at SAR’s Uitenhage Mechanical Workshops and placed in service on 23 May 1911. The classification 'Native' was in addition to the more widely used first, second and third class classification. These vehicles were a vast improvement on previous Native coaches which, in the worst case, were nothing more than upgraded cattle wagons and at best, purpose-built very spartan vehicles like the type J-7 and J-11 built for the CSAR which were scrapped in the early 1930’s, being considered no longer suitable for passenger use. Native coaches were intended to provide affordable local transport to those with limited means such as migrant mine workers. The body and underframe of the type J-12 illustrated had many of the characteristics of the old CGR but originally received CSAR numbers prior to the renumbering of all coaches into the SAR series in 1912. The bodies were divided centrally in their length by a transverse partition in which there was a door which could be locked, thus dividing the saloon into two separate large compartments if so desired. The seats were arranged longitudinally down each side and down the middle of the saloon with separate toilets for each compartment in the middle on each side of the partition. As these toilets, in view of their position in the middle of the coach, could not be ventilated by means of windows in the body sides, this was done by providing a short length of lantern (also known as clerestory) roof above the toilets. At a date not yet determined 3117 became a School Coach without modification, the purpose and intended route not known at this stage. Apart from two vehicles that were scrapped early in their lives, one being 3119 after a head-on collision between Mapleton and Glenroy on 27 July 1927, three gave remarkable service in excess of 60 years each. Coach 3117 was scrapped at Uitenhage in July 1969."
5. That crew had laid on a good fire; it was necessary. Check the altitude on the Alicedale nameboard: as you see, it says 'altitude 905 feet'. At Cold Spring siding, 27 miles later, we'll be 1540 feet higher after two hours of continuous heavy steaming.
6. Moving back a few years yet, in July 1956 I was on a family trip to Port Alfred. From Alicedale we had GDs fore and aft on a holiday-loaded mixed, 551-down. Our train already had the 'Right Away' and the starter for the Grahamstown line was off which left not much time to get a photo...... The Kowie line was on staffs while the mainline was on van Schoor tablets and the station foreman was trotting off to the crew of 118-up (which had brought us from Port Elizabeth) to hand them the tablet for the section from Alicedale to Doringkom. Busy times.
On SAR, banked trains could be loaded to twice the individual engine's load, in this case 2 X 330 tons, which was a much more economical way of working two engine trains when taking into account the restriction of 1¾ X the sum of the individual engine's loads for doubleheaders that illogically prevailed almost to the end of steam.
7. Why is it that original station infrastructure seemed to have far more character than that built as replacements? A case in point is Alicedale. Here a special running behind train 435 from Bloemfontein with, among others, a through coach from Durban to Port Elizabeth in which your photographer was a passenger, was waiting for formalities to be completed before departure. It was Peter's first trip behind a diesel on the main line and the single class 33 handled the 16-coach train with surprising ease. Note how in the old station the train had to pull up beyond the platform end to ensure that the baggage van could be placed at the platform, a compromise where milk cans and luggage won over passengers in the leading coaches.
Alicedale’s only claim to fame was the fact that it was a junction, proudly displayed in concrete by the station nameboard. 1969
8. Class 10BR No 749, once the pride of the Port Elizabeth suburban services but now relegated to shunting duties, was station pilot on the day Alicedale was visited, seen here waiting for the arrival of 435-down and the Grahamstown through coach. 1970
9. Train 435 used to bring a through coach from Johannesburg to Grahamstown, removed from the rear of the train by the station pilot. Here we see a steel first and second-class composite coach of type D-40 already attached to the mixed train to Grahamstown. There were no through passengers on this day and Peter's friend Geoff Gooderham occupying one of the compartments had joined the train at Alicedale. Adjacent to the through coach is a composite Hendrie balcony coach of type D-15, the passenger portion of the mixed being completed by a suburban type composite brake end. 1970.
10. With the train to Grahamstown now made up, the locomotive, a class 19B, was almost ready to depart. Even the soldier, no doubt based at the military camp in Grahamstown, showed more than a passing interest in the activities at the head end of the train. 1970.
11. GDA 2255 moves off shed at Alicedale preparatory to taking 549-down passenger to Port Alfred. In the background, a 19D is backing onto 22-up T&P destined for Cradock and Hyde class 10 Pacific 745, very much in her dotage, is performing station pilot duties.
In February 1968 the last GD on the Kowie line was sent to Sydenham for staging. Their place was meant to be taken by the well-made (Linke-Hoffman) GDAs released by the North Coast electrification in Natal (see SoAR, Natal, Parts 15, 16 and 17). But because of delays caused by the tremendous traffic surge on the North Coast the first two, Nos 2255 & 2256, only arrived that December. They entered traffic immediately. But something had happened since the GDs departed. The crews got used to non-articulated engines - the Garratts were really two engines in one and therefore much more work to prepare for the road. The upshot was that Alicedale and Grahamstown sheds gave the GDAs an emphatic thumbs down and they were sent packing to Sydenham within a coupla months. At that time the Midland was receiving brand-new class 33s by the dozen so they refused the offer of more GDAs and Natal sent the rest straight from the North Coast to the scrapheap.
I'm a born conspiracy theorist, so please indulge another idea: according to contemporary WTBs the GDA's were allowed almost 20% more load than a 19D, therefore it was considerably to the company's advantage to use GDAs (which were good engines). But they had no chance on the Kowie line because of the obduracy of LEMAS, the footplate staff's Union who were able to convince management that hand-fired Garratts were too much work (another advantage for the crews was that 20% more trains meant more jobs - especially overtime) while at the same time it was an unspoken strategy of the Midland management to convince head office of their need for diesels. This one backfired - it was to be another 20 years before 19Ds were replaced by class 35s and by then most of the traffic had vaporised anyway.
12. On a Friday in December 1968 there was some time to go before the 11:30 departure of 551-down mixed (being a Friday the train and engine were running through to Port Alfred). GDA 2256 basked in the midday sun while her crew brewed a pot of tea. Looks like the driver of the station pilot, 10BR 753, will be joining them while her fireman chats up a local belle.
13. During the hiatus caused by the delay in sending GDAs from Natal at least two class 24s were sent to Alicedale on loan. They were not the ideal motive power for a line that had one of the toughest sections in the country (in 14½ twisting miles from the second New Year's River bridge to Highlands the line climbed 1,340 feet). Having just brought in a goods from Grahamstown, 24 cl 3663 was about to back into the loco. December 1968.
14. GD 2229 departing Alicedale with 551-down, the 12:25 mixed to Port Alfred, banked by GD 2233 in September 1966.
15. Moments later along came GD 2233 shoving hard at the rear of 551-down. SoAR's coach fundi, Peter Stow: "the coach, also brilliantly illustrated, is a unique 'Made only in South Africa' type. Built with a lighter type of underframe for branch-line use, it is in essence a train in one coach. As can be seen from the class classification on the fascia board, starting from the left, one compartment for first and two compartments for second class passengers of European descent separated by toilets from one half first class compartment and one second class compartment for people of colour. Then there were three compartments for passengers travelling third class, a baggage section and finally a compartment for the guard. It is coach 7261 of type V-21-C of era three (May 1928 to October 1935) and no less than 43 examples were built in four batches from 1931 to 1933, eleven of which were allocated to the Cape Midland System for use on branch lines. One wonders if the CME's design team ever envisaged these lighter coaches being subjected to compression from banking engines during their lifetime."
16. The banked train going away with #2233 still pushing for all she was worth. Luckily the speed was sufficiently low for Vic to change slides on his 4"X 5" Speed Graphic, the classic sport photographer's sheet-film camera of the 1930s. If it was kept in kilter (which Victor's always was) it could produce pin-sharp enlargements the size of the wall of this room.
17. Now that we've seen off some trains from the sixties we'll move forward into the eighties by which time Alicedale station had been expensively relocated and remodelled with brand-new passenger facilities and a new (steam) loco depot. Dick found three Dollies on 'shed' in September 1982. These improvements saw barely ten years before being made redundant by the switch to diesels followed in quick succession by abandonment of the passenger services to Grahamstown and Port Alfred. Planning for the future was not one of SAR's strong points.
18. 19D 2763 at Alicedale with the 04:45 mixed to G/Town. 30 December 1982. A fine very-early morning portrait of a train that had a reputation among scholars and students returning from Port Elizabeth to Grahamstown, an important academic town. Here is driver Geoff's apt comment:
"The overnight PE to Grahamstown must have been one of the slowest THROUGH trains on SAR. The timings were more or less the same over the years. The train departed PE at 20:30 and only arrived at Grahamstown the next morning at 07.10. The coaches stood at Alicedale from 23.19 until 04.45! Not sure if there was any steam heating all that time*, otherwise it would be a tad cold in those compartments during the winter."
*there wasn't. Make that i-c-y Geoff...... (spoken from personal experience).
Traffic on the Kowie line peaked between 1965 and 1975. Shifting it all on a single-track mountainous line could be tricky. This is how they did it on 6 December 1965 (thank you Bruce).
19. Winding the clock back again we find GDA 2256 working 551-down, the train she was waiting for in photo 12, about a mile out of Alicedale in unflattering December sun. There were plans to come back here and get some decent pictures in winter. How could we know the GDAs would be sent away scarcely a month later? Poor things, they weren't given a chance.
20. Notwithstanding the Road Transport Act, the excellent marketing staff at Port Elizabeth ensured that good loadings continued into the 1980s and passenger numbers were holding well. Double-heading was fairly common, testified by this well-stocked 33345-down mixed in June 1981.
21. This train could have been hauled by one GD or GDA. If there was even one wagon too many for a single engine it would be doubleheaded at heavy cost.
22. Black & white photography has added drama to Allen's study of GD 2229 bursting out of the New Year's tunnel (No 1) in May 1966.
23. Years of experience had taught Dusty not to take any chances when a new class was introduced anywhere. Thus he made sure he was there to record GDA 2255 emerging from the New Year's tunnel on her maiden run in December 1968. In the consist are three heavy tankers of fuel for the Military Base at Grahamstown.
24. Class 19Ds 2753 + 3340 with the mid-morning Alicedale to Grahamstown mixed, exiting the New Year's tunnel a short distance out of Alicedale. 24 September 1987.
25. Her fireman having laid on a mighty fire in preparation for the fearsome bank, 19D 2761 tows the afternoon Grahamstown goods across the New Year's river, leaving a smoky tunnel behind. This bridge marks the beginning of the continuous slog to Cold Spring and although the worst of the 1/40 ends at Highlands it will be 26 miles, or more than two hours, before the fireman can stow his shovel. 8 August 1981.
26. Barely two miles beyond the New Year's spruit bridge we are already high above the dam with 19D 2736 well and truly in charge of a light train on the steep section up to Stonehaven - this was 17 June 1985 by which time traffic was on the decline.
27. Only a few years earlier, in June 1981, the 19Ds of 33345-down mixed had their teeth into the 1/40 leading up to Stonehaven.
28. Twelve years earlier GDA 2255 seemed to be proving her worth to the Grahamstown line as she brought eight vehicles of 549-down passenger up the 1/40 to Stonehaven in fine style. This was a fortnight before Christmas 1968 so the parcels van behind the engine must have been crammed full.
29. Easy to chase a train that's only doing about 12mph! The same 33345-down mixed that appears in photos 20 and 27 above, a bit closer to Stonehaven now.
30. Port Elizabeth resident Alan made many trips to the Port Alfred line. Occasionally he would ask the crews to make a bit of smoke at a certain spot, in this instance near Stonehaven. The fireman is clearly admiring the results of his handiwork. May 1984.
31. Petroleum for Grahamstown was conveyed in 539-down on Saturday mornings, in this case with 19B 1405. December 1968.
32. Take another look at the previous photo: did you spot the miniature pith helmets decorating the of top each fence post? These galvanised, hollow-metal posts were installed on both sides of the line along the entire 78 miles from Alicedale to Grahamstown. The Victorians did things in style - even when money was tight. Looks like they were about four yards apart - that's 68,000 miniature pith helmets. Nice contract for F Morton who (it says) held the patent rights.....
Hardly had the above been written when the following arrived from SoAR correspondent Mike Swift: "The fence posts were a product of Francis Morton & Co., Liverpool, a leading supplier of fencing, gates, corrugated iron buildings, bridges and structural ironwork from 1853. Their "Strained Wire Fencing" was patented in 1859 and the attached advert of 1896 (from Graces Guide) shows exactly the type of post you illustrate. The company supplied railways in the UK and overseas, and I've come across their products in Africa, India, South America and especially in Australia, where they seemed to have made a specialty of dingo proof fencing around graveyards, the gates to which carried a large iron worksplate to identify its origin."
Mike has asked us to credit an extraordinary record of what made Britain great, to: 'Grace's Guide to British Industrial History'
33. 19Ds 2515 and 2756 head the 12:15 Alicedale to Grahamstown mixed near Stonehaven in July 1978.
34. By the 1980s the old 541-down had become 33341-down, still 04:45 off Alicedale. Here Alan has caught up with her just after sunrise somewhere between Stonehaven and Highlands. In winter the considerate shunting staff at Alicedale would marshall the parcels van just ahead of the guard's van so the passenger coaches could be connected to the steam heating. The next step was to convince the fireman that he needed to be considerate too, but it was rare to find one who would share a precious drop of steam on the ferocious climb to Cold Spring. You can tell the passengers have been left to freeze by the lack of steam bleeding off from the compartment radiators.
35. In May 1982 chairman of the Port Elizabeth branch of the RSSA, Bruce Brinkman, organised a weekend excursion to Port Alfred, for which a through coach was hired. We travelled from PE on 33304-up which carried this interesting endorsement in the WTB: "Conveys passengers, parcels and mail. Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays also passengers all stations Grahamstown and Port Alfred branch. Stops to allow passengers to entrain from Alicedale to destinations north of Cookhouse (Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays also conveys passengers Alicedale to Cookhouse). Conveys mail from Uitenhage and Port Elizabeth for Grahamstown and must connect with train 33341 at Alicedale."
One had to admire operating staff who carried all that in their heads.
The upshot was that after a chilly night in Alicedale we duly left there at 04:45 on a Saturday morning with the RSSA's coach attached to train 33341-down. At dawn there wasn't much to see as the weather appeared to be completely socked in. Somehow we had contrived to run late so by the time we were approaching the tunnel before Cold Spring there was enough light in the lifting mist to get this desperate shot of our two Dollies making a noisy meal of the climb.
36. It must have been almost at the same moment that Alan took this one of our train finally emerging from the mist.
37. 549-down with GDA 2255 again (photo 29) approaching Highlands, from where the uphill from Alicedale eases off a bit.
38. The start-to-stop average speed of 549-down from Alicedale to Grahamstown was 12mph (wow!) including stops but she's climbing 1/40 remember. This gave time to get plenty of photos and enjoy a mug of tea in between. After a hectic chase on the dirt road we caught up again just before Atherstone.
39. 19Ds 2738 and 2714 on a special passenger train from Alicedale, 6 July 1978. This was probably an empty-stock working to carry students from Grahamstown colleges on the return. Note the ex-works clerestory stock at the front of the train.
40. GD 2234 with 554-up mixed between Highlands and Cold Spring, May 1966
41. Waiting room and erstwhile clerk's office at Atherstone in June 1981. The Works Inspector's gang has been through recently and seem to have done a good job (but expensive with all that new corrugated iron). The fascia boards are still in pink undercoat so it looks as if they'll be back to finish the job.
42. Unless it was running late, even in spring it was impossible to get daylight shots of 33341-down. But Eugene has done a good job of turning the pre-dawn to his advantage. You can see the ambient temperature was low but again the fireman was too snoep to spare any steam for the carriage heating. Those coaches look as if they've come straight from the batch that were ordered a few months before the decision to slash the countrywide long-distance train service. Near Atherstone, 19D 3330 with 33341-down, the 04:45 Alicedale to Grahamstown mixed with through coaches from Port Elizabeth. 24 September 1987.
43. 19D 2525 with 33343-down, the 20.30 Saturdays only Port Elizabeth to Port Alfred, 05.20 ex Alicedale, on Sunday 30 January 1977 - shown in the public timetable as a through train to Port Alfred. The train was approaching the shortest of the three tunnels at milepost 95¾* between Atherstone and Cold Spring. As you see, the countryside is hilly; the further east one travels the more rugged the terrain, which is one of the reasons why the main line by-passed Grahamstown.
*Until metrication in 1971 the distances on the branch were measured from Port Elizabeth.
44. One of the last railtours to present a complete rake of clerestory stock was the Transcape Limited, here depicted between Atherstone and Cold Spring in April 1985. By this time the successor to SAR, known as 'South African Transport Services' was in deep trouble; nose-diving passenger and freight revenues meant that funds could not be spared for continued maintenance of these venerable vehicles..
45. In his shitty-brown SATS uniform that replaced the dignified SAR one c 1981, the guard struts importantly back to the van having carried out his duty of changing the points for 33342-up Saturdays only, mixed at Cold Spring - summit of the line. 16 March 1985. The changes of name and uniform did nothing to repel the shock of the Road Transportation Act.
46. Another crossing at Cold Spring. Alan writes: "at every halt, always passengers waiting to board"
47. Exchanging orders at Cold Spring. On the left is 33342-up mixed with 19D 2736 and on the opposing train is 19D 3337 in charge of 3377-down, by 1985 ostensibly a goods but on Saturdays passenger coaches were added. Yes, some railwaymen were still taking the "Services" part of the new name seriously.
48. After Cold Spring the line descends sharply into the natural basin formed by the headwaters of the Bloukrans River, wherein lies Grahamstown. GDA 2255 was drifting down West Hill with train 549 that we had followed all the way from Alicedale. We never saw a GDA on a passenger working again.
49. GD 2223 bringing 543-down goods (05:50 off Alicedale) into Grahamstown station in May 1966.
50. A soggy day in Gra-hams-town.... 19D 2736 "Geduld" (Patience) pulls into platform 1 with the 04:45 passenger from Alicedale, two hours late on 26 September 1987.
51. According to the relevant WTBs, 33341-down (as here) and its predecessor 541-down, brought the mails. December 1982.
52. Grahamstown in 1896; another immortal glass-plate exposure by E H Short. When you've finished studying the attire of the station staff (dig those bowler hats!) please pay attention to the outside double slip in the foreground. I first saw one of these at the new Johannesburg station c 1955 but here was one installed by the CGR > sixty years earlier. Unreal. Also worth noting are the attractive station buildings and the neat CGR carriages.
53. The locomotive shed (later converted to a goods shed - see photo 64) and watertower at Grahamstown by E H Short, probably on the same day as the previous photo.
54. Les's fine study of GD 2221 at Grahamstown in 1960 when the GDs were the mainstay power on the line, a predominance that had prevailed for more than a decade. In the background, another of those primitive 'Skoliere Alleenlik' coaches.
55. Immaculate GD 2229 on shed in Grahamstown in April 1962. Note the S2 receiving attention on the right. As you will see in photo 60 those were the days when SAR could barely cope with all the business coming their way from Albany district and road power could not be spared for shunting duties.
56. Another view of GD 2229 inside the old shed (in fact the second of the three sheds that served Grahamstown over the years).
57. By 1968 Grahamstown had acquired a state of the art coaling appliance, a turntable and a brand-new running shed. Emerging from the shed is one of the recently-transferred GDAs while a class 24 is being coaled. Use of the ultra-light 24s on this line is indicative of the motive-power shortage that prevailed countrywide during the economic boom of the sixties. By the end of the year the two 24s had been drafted away, never to return.
58. Sunrise at Grahamstown shed was worth getting up for; several 19Ds are being prepared for their day's work at the final modern loco shed in July 1978.
59. Class 19D 2753 is back home in Grahamstown after working the morning mixed trains to and from Alicedale with sister engine 3340, and now has three of the shed staff in attendance to manoeuvre the armstrong turntable before it heads off to the shed to be prepared for its next trip. 24th September 1987.
60. On the evening of 24th September 1987, three 19Ds occupy the loco shed at Grahamstown when the Alicedale - Grahamstown branch was still 100% steam. On the right is 2751 and on the left, 3337 with 2735 behind.
61. This is what Grahamstown's yard looked like in 1962 when it had so much business it could hardly cope. The GD is departing with a freight for Port Alfred. In the left background another GD is making up trains pending the release of the S2 receiving attention in photo 58.
62. By April 1962 Grahamstown's GD allocation had been reduced from 4 to 3, and 19Ds increased from 1 to 3. On a cool morning this ill-maintained example was heading 545-down goods to Port Alfred. Note that between Grahamstown and Port Alfred engines invariably hauled feeder tanks.
63. The regular mixed to Port Alfred is seen entering a large S-bend near Oak Valley on the climb out of Grahamstown in July 1981.
64. Going towards Port Alfred the third stop out of Grahamstown was Manley Flats, a busy station in its heyday but it never recovered from the suicide of its Stationmaster c 1955.
65. Manley Flats, GD 2234 getting under way again with 549-down, May 1966.
66. Bruce, who was well in with Operating, arranged some photostops on the RSSA's 1982 trip to and from Port Alfred. This was one on the outward journey at Blaauwkrantz bridge, of which more anon.
67. A maintenance gang photographed at the end of their task by the looks of it. No date accompanied the photo but it could have been made upon completion of the track and bridge repairs following the 1911 derailment. This photo emphasises the sturdy lines of the structure and gives the lie to sensational versions of the disaster (see image 100) that claimed it was its collapse that had cost so many lives. The bridge actually survived for another 17 years after the accident when it was replaced with a stronger structure to cater for heavier axleloads.
68. What looks like a Cape 4th-class locomotive heads a rake of hand-me-down ex CGR (or possibly hired?) four-wheeled carriages on a coast-bound Kowie Railway train c mid 1890s.
69. 19D 2761 heads the 07.25 Grahamstown to Port Alfred mixed across Bloukrans River Bridge on 6 July 1978 (the new spelling came into effect in 1953 by decree of the Government's place-names commission).
70. It looks like a good field of cabbages in the foreground as a 19D heads the daily mixed to Port Alfred across the Bloukrans River bridge in September 1982.
71. In July 1978, the morning Grahamstown to Port Alfred mixed consists of a type V-36-C all classes van, three main line third class coaches bracketed by a goods guard’s van. No freight traffic on this day. The train stands out against the menacing kranses of the Blaauwkrantz River gorge. "Local Africans believed demons and ghosts inhabited the forbidding gorge and always insisted on waiting for a while before entering to appease the spirits". This place had a kind of spooky atmosphere - probably since the bridge disaster but reinforced by Bruno's extract from George Pauling's "Chronicles of a Contractor" (which, by the way, remains a classic of railway literature).
72. 19D 2763 climbs out of the Bloukrans River Valley with the Port Alfred mixed in June 1981 [note: Dick has used the Afrikaans spelling. Until 1953 the Dutch "Blaauwkrantz" was used.]
73. In September 1977 Geoff found 19D 2714 with the 07:25 Grahamstown-Port Alfred mixed heading away from a tidy and busy Martindale.
74. Trappes Valley (named after Captain Charles Trappes, founder of Bathurst)*, December 1987, 19D 2755 departing with the Port Alfred mixed - by this time downgraded to goods status with the endorsement in the public timetable that it would convey passengers 'when run'.....
*thank you Chris Jeffery
75. 19D 2714 at Bathurst with the 07.25 Grahamstown to Port Alfred goods on 30 September 1977. All around were signs of a well-organised, well-run, busy railway so what happened? Well it is no concidence that 1977* was the year of the Road Transportation Act.
* SAR's 9/11
76. A Google Earth view of the railway approaching Port Alfred (off the bottom of this image) showing where the triangle was (at Aldrington farm) because it couldn't fit in down at the station. In fact there was a triangle down at the station and it was in use at least until the GDs left. Problem was it was only 4-chains radius [=264 feet] so it was deemed too tight for eight-coupled engines. Once the Dollies took over the drill was for down trains to have their engine turned on the airfield triangle before descending to the station (thank you Bruce).
This extract from the Topo map shows the wartime line to the airport. However, for 'security reasons' the actual line which was built in the early 1940s to serve the flying school was never shown on official government topo maps (thank you Bruno and Bruce).
77. A 19D has just arrived at Port Alfred with the Saturday mixed, except that with no goods traffic it was a fully fledged passenger train. Note the tidiness of the station surrounds. 1970.
78. In spite of the FDs ('modified Fairlies' by NBL) spending more than twenty years on the Port Alfred line this is the only photograph we have come across of one of them at work here. In 1947 they were superseded by the GD Garratts after the latter were displaced from the Mossel Bay-Oudtshoorn run by new GEAs. FDs were equal to the GDs in nominal tractive effort so ought to have been equally useful but we are told by D F Holland that [they] "were not entirely satisfactory as the long overhang at front and back tended to vibrate in an up-and-down direction when the engine was in motion, with a consequent setting up of metal fatigue and cracking of the frames. Apart from this rather serious defect they were powerful and good steamers but did not enjoy a very long life"*. I suppose it depends upon the definition of a long life but according to the General Manager's Annual Reports two were withdrawn in 1948 and the other two in 1949.
* Steam Locomotives of the South African Railways Volume 2 pp 50/51
79. Although the railway reached Grahamstown first, it was not the first railway in Albany District. This was a little-remarked standard-gauge layout built to serve the harbour construction at Port Alfred where work had been carrying on since 1841. By 1863 the harbour could admit ocean-going vessels under guidance of a steam tug, and Port Alfred's harbour was attracting business to and from the district. But the river port remained hampered by its sand bar, shallow anchorages and lack of a rail connection. Discovery of diamonds at Kimberley emphasised these handicaps but it seemed that further development might allow Port Alfred to gain the advantage over Port Elizabeth as the preferred port for Diamond Field's business. In 1874 the standard-gauge contractor's 0-4-2T that had been used in the construction of the Cape Town-Wellington railway was acquired by the harbour developers to supplant the oxen previously used to haul stone from the quarries to the works. By 1877 the scale of the work justified a second engine and this arrived in January 1878.
Note the brass builder's plate (Hawthorn & Co, Leith) propped up on the running board and the marine boiler on the right. It is thought that this once belonged to the aforementioned tug.
80. Built by Fox Walker of Bristol, 'Aid', the second standard-gauge engine at Port Alfred, was offloaded in two sections from the brigs Frieda and Lena on 1st January 1878. According to Holland she worked there until parked off in a shed c 1900. In 1915 she was tipped into a hole and buried. During the sixties she was unburied and found to be in restorable condition by Leith Paxton, who collaborated with the Port Elizabeth museum to locate the works drawings and draw up plans for her restoration. Unfortunately the curator of the Museum's transport project could not persuade the council to go ahead with a planned transport museum and the priceless remains of 'Aid' were furtively disposed of to Chicks, the scrap merchants.
81. The attractive Hunslet 4-4-0Ts of the Kowie Railway were designed to burn wood because at this time coal had to be imported from Wales.
82. Scanned off a print at the THL; a Kowie Railway mixed train made up and apparently ready to go. The flimsy-looking track curving away on the right looks as it is one leg of a triangle. In the background is one of the Hunslet 0-6-0T goods engines (later converted to 4-4-0Ts according to Holland).
83. Just look at those little darlings fresh out of Sunday School, each on their best behavior, the boys with catties in their back pockets. Whether this was an outing for the schoolchildren or a more serious occasion is not known. Note the huge and vacant tower: was it purely an architect's whim or had he originally intended the station to have a proper tower?
84. Railcar 23 at Port Alfred in 1939. It was probably based at the RMT siding in Grahamstown although we don't have solid evidence for this, but we do know from the contemporary WTBs that they worked a complicated diagram of which the main feature was a daily (SuX) departure from Port Alfred at 08:15. On Saturdays there was an additional one at 17:30 - the one in this incredibly rare photo unearthed and indexed by the DRISA crew.
The following information has been gleaned from Les's Photo Journal No 9: "[Railmotor 23] represents the standard design of railcar which evolved on the SAR in the late 1920s to early 1930s. 16 or 17 of these 37 foot long vehicles were eventually placed in service. They were powered by two Hudson 6-cylinder engines which could be used independently or in unison to propel the vehicle."
The railcars were quick, cheaper than a train and liked by the public so we don't know why they were discontinued on this line c 1940.
85. In the previous two photos you will have seen the purely decorative tower on the station building. When this photo was made it was still there but the train service had changed. Three times/week there used to be a through coach from Port Alfred to Johannesburg but by July 1956 this had been reduced to Sundays only. Faced with 1/40 directly off the platform end that GD and her crew were doing some serious brewing up. Hardly conscious of these exertions those old ducks chatting to someone in the through coach were seeing off a friend or family in the days when getting anywhere by train was an incomparable adventure.
86. More colourful and much more efficient than a dirty old steam engine; more than thirty years later, in March 1990, class 35 diesel 35-070 was about to depart from Port Alfred with the return working of the daily weekday goods to Grahamstown. There was still PX container traffic and even one of the old RMT trailers loaded in a DZ, but no passenger coaches. At some time in the intervening years the station building lost its tower so it looks more like any station anywhere. We are told this is one building that escaped vandalism by being converted into a museum. Some other features are as they always were - like the euphorbias in the background. But the adventure has gone.......
87. Look at this! MUCH more drama than that nice clean diesel. The 17:05 Port Alfred-Grahamstown departing from Port Alfred in July 1956. Digital photography was a long way off when I loaded my 35mm Zeiss Contax with a 36-exposure roll of ASA 10 Kodachrome (£2-10s or >R20 per frame in today's money). This was an ambitious effort with the train doing about 15mph in evening gloom - 1/60th of a second at f2.8 didn't quite cut it. In the background is the station with its tower still bathed in soft sunlight.
88. By the time George Pattison took this shot of 19B 1405 departing from Port Alfred in 1969 the tower had gone!
89. The vegetation changes as one moves away from the coast - the Euphorbias and Corral trees start to thin out as can be seen here with a 19D on the return mixed approaching Trappes Valley in July 1982.
90. GD 2237 arriving at Trappes Valley with 552-up mixed in May 1966. Everything neat, tidy and organised, all set to be so for the next 100 years, right?
91. Having stopped for passengers GD 2237 accelerates 552-up mixed away from Trappes Valley - note that every siding is busy with traffic.
92. Martindale was a lonely place but until the mid-eighties when SATS gave up accepting or dispatching consignments from here, it had a house-proud Station Master. This was May 1966 when almost every siding had wagons being loaded or off-loaded and at watering stations the time-honoured rituals of a steam-operated railway were being performed several times a day.
93. Dead side on of GD 2237 on 552-up being fussed over at Martindale. This is the same train as in the previous two pictures.
94. To commemorate the centenary of the opening of the Kowie Railway on 1 October 1884, a special train organised by the Lower Albany Historical Society was run from Grahamstown to Port Alfred on Sunday 30 September 1984. The train is seen here at Martindale on its return journey.
95. 19D 2763 heads the returning mixed at Longridge between Forrestdale and Bloukrans in June 1981
96. An undated photo of the Blaaukrantz bridge being crossed by a train hauled by a CGR 4th class 4-6-0T+T locomotive.
97. Peter Stow's precis of the Grocott's Penny Mail Memorial Edition (below) tells us this sketch by JM English is quite a startling portrayal of the actual moment the train left the rails.
THE BLAAUWKRANTZ BRIDGE DISASTER
Railway accidents have over the years captured the minds of the public. This was especially true during the era when rail was the predominant form of transport. The closer the event occurred to one, the greater the interest shown, especially as friends or relatives may have been involved. This was even more relevant when such an accident occurred in an otherwise peaceful rural community where everyone knew everyone else and when there were a significant number of fatalities and injuries. The Blaauwkrantz derailment was one such disaster.
As word spread through Grahamstown that there had been an accident on the Blaauwkrantz Bridge business came to a standstill. As many Grahamstown people were in Port Alfred at the time the question arose as to how many friends and relatives may have been aboard the doomed train. There was also disbelief that such an event could occur on their “own” railway. The 43 mile line between Port Alfred and Grahamstown was run by the Kowie Railway Company and linked with SAR's Alicedale–Grahamstown branch at Grahamstown. Alicedale was the junction with the main line between Port Elizabeth and Johannesburg.
News of the disaster reached Grahamstown at 10.25am on Saturday morning, 22 April 1911 by way of the driver Mr.Robinson and fireman of the train who brought with them the engine and three wagons which was all that was left of the hapless train. Station Master Mr. Fred Connock immediately notified the medical faculty of the disaster and started preparing a relief train which left at 11.10 with doctors Fitzgerald, Reid and Harrison, nurses Williams and Sydesuff and male hospital attendants Preston and Hartwell bearing surgical bandages and other accessories, arriving at the scene at 11.48. It was only then that the full scope of the disaster was realised.
From the dizzy height of 56m above the river all that could be seen was some wreckage lying on the rocks on the southern side and Port Alfred end of the bridge. In the centre of the bridge was a wagon lying on its side. Its contents had been stone quarried for the Grahamstown cathedral, half of which had been precipitated into the valley below. It was from the wreckage that the dead and injured had to be extricated and lifted up the precipitous gorge. It was a painful experience both for the injured as well as the rescuers. The timber bodied carriages had disintegrated upon impact with the valley below, leaving just the steel underframes and wheels as evidence of what had been.
It transpired that the train had comprised 6 wagons, 3 carriages and a guards van. As the train started crossing the bridge the coupling between the third and fourth wagons broke. A witness Mr. Leslie Palmer described how he watched the train crossing the bridge and at a point approximately a quarter of the way over the bridge he saw a box truck begin canting to one side. It continued to lean more and more until it finally fell over the bridge pulling the other carriages with it.
Miraculous Escape
Amidst this tragedy was a single miraculous escape for the seven year old Hazel Maud Smith. She was looking out of one of the carriage windows on the side of the bridge over which the train plunged and fell out onto one of the cross beams of the girders. The girders were approximately 2m apart. She managed to clutch hold of her little 3 year old brother Willie until her strength began to fail her and she watched in horror as he fell to the bottom of the ravine. He later died of his injuries. Hazel was finally rescued by Mr. Davidson and Mr. Palmer but was now an orphan as both her parents were killed in the accident.
The final death toll was 28 with 23 injured. As described in Bruno Martin's introduction, the Kowie Railway Company was held responsible for the accident and never recovered, being liquidated the following year while the line was taken over by the SAR in 1913. The line from Grahamstown to Port Alfred was closed in 2001 and it is unlikely that trains will ever cross the Blaauwkrantz River again.
98. An unknown GD hauling 550-up, the 11:50 Port Alfred-Grahanstown goods across the bridge in July 1956.
99. The artist in Leith inspired him to use the orange grove to our advantage, it directs the eye straight to the subject: a GD with freight bound for Grahamstown and points beyond.
100. With the RSSA's smart UCW coach in its consist, 19D 2761 performs a runpast for the passengers with 970-up, 11:50 off Port Alfred in May 1982. Note that the timing of this train had not changed in 26 years.
101. 19D 2763 working hard with the returning mixed, past several stands of Aloe Ferox near Manley Flats, June 1981.
102. GD 2237 with 552-up mixed nearing Manley Flats in May 1966. Second from the back is the 'Scholar's Coach' - refer to Peter Stow's description of it with photo 4.
103. To the bemusement of the 3rd-class passengers, the crew of 19D 2761 with 970-up did a false start out of Manley Flats for the benefit of RSSA members. May 1982
104. Approaching the headwaters of the Bloukrantz River between Manley flats and Oak Valley.
105. GD 2230 with 542-up goods crossing the Bloukrans river for the second time at Oak Valley, May 1966
106. Judging by the predominance of CGR 4-wheeled 'bone-shaker' carriages, this photo, along with the next is probably one of the earliest views of Grahamstown station. The engine looks like one of the Midland's Cape 1st-class 4-4-0T+T (series M44-M49) as described by Holland and depicted on page 26 of 'Steam Locomotives of the South African Railways' Vol 1.
107. We found this on the Heritage website, but would dearly like a higher-res version to publish here. If anyone can help please let us know. It depicts a CGR train with Cape 1st-class locomotive apparently about to leave for Alicedale, c 1880, possibly on the same day as the previous photo.
108. 'Supreme irony' is an old cliche but this is about as ironical as it gets. A culture of destruction is overtaking civilisation in South Africa............
109. This and the next few photos show the state of the once elegant (and busy) station in 2013 and although we hear that attempts are to be made to restore the buildings it would be enormously expensive and we remain skeptical.
110. The ruins of the ticket office. The floor has been destroyed in the expectation of finding copper pipes and cables. If you're curious where the roof sheets have ended up, they seem to be here.
111. Trackside before the scrap thieves got in with their gas cutting equipment. Nowadays not even the rails are secure. The trench between the tracks is where the signal cables were ferreted out by copper thieves.
112. This was seven years ago! Check the GDA, we'll have better pictures of it in our dekbrief.
113. Grahamstown as it was in March 1983; a respectable cathedral city and centre of learning. On the right is the cathedral, in the middle is the angel statue which commemorates the soldiers who fell in the Boer War. Its inscription was written by Rudyard Kipling. The elegant building on the left houses a well-known furniture chain (no, Briggs, we are not related).
This was the middle of a once-gracious town. They've changed it's name to Makhanda. You don't want to see it today.
114. Generally speaking the GDs worked bunker first towards Alicedale. This was GD 2229 coming off shed to work 542-up, the 10:05 Grahamstown-Alicedale mixed, in March 1961.
115. On a Saturday in April 1962 these two GDs were about to set out to Alicedale and Port Alfred respectively. GD 2237 on the right was about to work 546-up, the 14:00 to Alicedale while GD 2229 on the left was being prepared to work 549-down, the 14:10 to Port Alfred.
116. A short while later GD 2237 was about to leave for Alicedale.
117. Quiet moment in Grahamstown with class 7 No 980 simmering away in platform 2, the afternoon Alicedale made up and ready to roll in platform 1 on the right and the Port Alfred mixed in platform 3 on the left.
118. Until the early 1970s Grahamstown used hand-me-down road engines to perform shunting and yard pilot duties (the exception was a brief period in 1962 when an S2 was stationed here for that express purpose). In this scene from December 1968, class 7 No 980 sets off with two tankers of fuel for the military siding (takes off at Goodwins Kloof, see Bruno's map) and coal for the Municipal power station situated on a siding three miles up the West Hill. Connection of the city to the national grid brought this business abruptly to an end in the 1980s.
The made-up train on the right is 546-up, 13:55 to Alicedale with a through coach to Port Elizabeth next to the FZ truck doubling as a parcels van.
119. Interior of Grahamstown signal box in December 1982.
120. Class 19D 2753 teamed up with 2736 named "Geduld" (Patience), ready to depart from Grahamstown with train 33340/33301, the 20:30 Daily except Saturdays passenger to Alicedale and Port Elizabeth. 24 September 1987.
121. At Grahamstown on 12 May 1973, 19D 2515 was at the head of a complete rake of clerestory carriages making up the 12.30 to Alicedale. This was a through train to Port Elizabeth.
122. The 08:35 goods (with passenger accommodation), No 3378-up to Alicedale departing from Grahamstown in July 1981.
123. On a cool and cloudy spring afternoon the Lady Grey Street bridge at the south end of Grahamstown station provided a good vantage point to record the 16:40 Mixed to Alicedale making a steamy departure behind double-headed 19D's 3330 and 3340. In 1979 Eugene recorded 3330 as being based at Bethlehem.
124. Those three bogies of coal bound for the Municipal power station are making this Belpaire 6 talk. A beautiful shot by the late, great photographer, Chris Butcher, in 1967.
The red line is the route of the mile-long Military siding to Grahamstown's airbase, in use at least until 1997 as borne out by the extract from SA Rail below.
125. Amidst the playing fields of Graeme College, two pedestrians turn their heads to watch class 19D's 2753 and 3340 making a spirited departure from Grahamstown with the lightly loaded 08:35 mixed to Alicedale. The spire of the cathedral in the centre of town catching the morning sun is visible just ahead of the train. 24 September 1987.
126. The morning mixed to Alicedale tackling the 1/50 out of town with double 19Ds heading a good length train in September 1982. I know this is ridiculous but somehow this picture reminds me of the even more spectacular Somerset & Dorset's climb away from Bath.
127. West Hill: empty fuel tankers returning to the Bay being dragged up the hill by GDA 2255 in December 1968.
128. On Saturdays the passenger to Alicedale left Grahamstown at lunchtime and is seen here single headed at the top of the climb near Cold Spring in July 1982.
129. After capturing the departure of the 16:40 Mixed to Alicedale from Grahamstown station (see photo 124), Eugene had enough time to drive to the top of the hill above the Waai Nek tunnel* (Tunnel 3). 19D's 3330 + 3340 have slogged their way up the climb through West Hill and Goodwins Kloof and are about to enter the tunnel, on the last leg to the summit at Cold Spring. Some of the traffic on this train would no doubt have originated in Port Alfred, arriving in time to be included in the load for this train. Clearly, the SAR's 'PX' parcel service was still doing good business! 24th September 1987.
* This was George Pauling's first railway contract, in early 1876 ("Chronicles of a Contractor" - Chapter XII).
130. Class 19D 2736 "Geduld" (Patience) about to enter Waai Nek tunnel (tunnel 3) on the last stretch of the climb from Grahamstown to the summit at Cold Spring; double-heading with 2735 on the 16:40 Mixed to Alicedale. 25th September 1987.
131. Approaching the summit of West Hill, GDA 2255 with the same train of empty fuel tankers depicted in photo 127. December 1968.
132. In 1896 the CGR's official photographer, E H Short visited the Grahamstown line. He had his own coach and, as he was wont to do, the moment the train stopped he would leap out, grab his tripod and enormous glass-plate camera and set up without bothering to close the doors.
There's quite a lot to see in this marvellous photo: firstly, Atherstone seems to have had a resident Station Master - probably a low-grade one in view of the very tiny community around there at that time (even smaller today). The SM's house is just behind the impatient-looking guard. This side, on the right, is what looks like a general-dealer's store and probably a post office as well. The advertisements are interesting, the one on the right seems to be for "Baines & Comp'y, Drapery & Clothing, Grahamstown", and beneath it the standard Pears soap sign that could be found wherever the Union Jack was flown. Those ads are sommer plakked onto the wall of the Gent's lavatory - note the little trapdoor for the balie. All these appointments of civilisation had disappeared by the 1980s (see the primitive corrugated-iron waiting room in photo 43).
133. The train paused long enough for Mr Short to make another exposure showing the goods platform and shed as well as the Cape 4th-class that was hauling his train.
134. 33342-up, the Saturdays-only 12:50 off Grahamstown, paused for passengers at Atherstone in July 1981. This was the quickest train to Port Elizabeth - its coaches went through on 33303-down from Alicedale, arriving in the Bay at 19:10.
135. It is not common knowledge that Boris had a gap-year job on Ellesmere farm near Highlands siding in 1981. Here he is supervising the loading of bags of maize in the traditional South African way........
136. The 07:40 goods off Grahamstown, 544-up with 19D 3363, paused for orders at Highlands in June 1981. On the left Boris is still supervising.
137. In July 1982, 19D 2756 was departing Highlands with the Saturdays-only 33342-up on a beautiful clear day - that's the Indian Ocean on the horizon, some 35 miles distant.
138. The morning mixed last seen in Photo 127 passes the aptly named Highlands. Unfortunately an excess of the Black stuff, not arranged, obscures the superb backdrop.
139. Crossing the well-known stone bridge over a country road at Highlands. The train was the ever-popular 33342-up behind 19D 3337, in June 1981.
140. 20 February 1982 – 19D 3340 crosses New Year's River with a nicely full dam in the background. Don’t look at the state of that dam now.......
Like many Frontier towns, Alicedale’s water infrastructure is almost as old as the town. Residents frequently experience burst pipes and leaks; but in a time of drought, these small issues have a big impact. “The system is old and antiquated,” said resident John Bateson. On the day Grocott’s Mail visited, the water was off in Alicedale due to a burst pipe. “We had probably three pipe bursts last week.”
Alicedale’s water comes from the New Year’s dam; a large dam about six to seven kilometres long inside a local nature reserve. The dam is fed by the New Year’s River, [a tributary of] the Bushmans River. “It was built by the railways during the age of steam,” said Bateson. “Six years ago we had a similar drought situation and the reserve got down to critical levels.
141. Saturdays-only 3376-up mixed, 07:45 off Grahamstown, runs into a patch of cold air approaching the New Year's tunnel in November 1987
142. In May 1984 the Saturdays-only 33342-up, approaching the New Year's tunnel with the dam in the background.
143. After a state visit to Grahamstown in June 1974 the White Train emerges from the New Year's tunnel. Grahamstown locomotive depot pulled out all the stops in preparing these 19Ds to work the most prestigious train in the country - the White Train carrying the State President. The drivers were also wearing their Sunday best, such was their pride in being afforded the privilege of working the train. Sadly, within a year it would be withdrawn as “an economy measure”; rumour at the time was that the wife of then State President Diedericks disliked train travel and was largely responsible for the train’s demise after an incident en-route to Durban where the train apparently jerked. She insisted they get off at Pietermaritzburg station and proceed to Durban by car, resulting in the hasty, unscheduled, off-loading of the State cars at Pietermaritzburg and cancellation of the official reception at Durban station.
The train had been fully upgraded in May 1969 which included the English rosewood veneers being replaced by local timber veneers and certain support vehicles also being replaced. It was also renumbered so that the coaches were consecutively numbered. Behind the locomotives are two motor-car vans, followed by three coaches specially built for the Royal visit in 1947. These are coach 52 which was previously number 40, the Queens coach, then coach 51, ex number 39 which carried the Princesses and coach 50, ex number 38 which had accommodated the secretaries. The next coach was number 49 ex number 126 of type A-36 which, although bought at the same time as the Royal Train, was actually acquired for the then Governor General's train for use as a lounge/diner. Coaches 48 and 47 for staff were ex type C-34 first class steel main line coaches with their distinctive roof profiles and the last visible vehicle is number 46, an articulated ex Travelling Post Office (TPO) van 4343 of type K-45.
144. In March 1984: train 33342, 19D 3340 approaching Alicedale beside the New Year's river.
145. 20 June 1987 – 2751 & 3337 running into Alicedale on a chilly morning with 3376-up mixed from Grahamstown
146. One of the two class 24s stationed at Grahamstown during 1968, No 3663 drawing into Alicedale with an Up goods in December 1968.
147. We started this chapter with the GDs, and appropriately we wind it up with a GD in its last month of service bringing a freight into Alicedale in February 1968.
148. How beautiful our trains were, as evidenced by this clean GD just arrived at Alicedale from Grahamstown in February 1966. So sad that all we have left are irreplaceable photographs.
149. After working the morning mixed from Grahamstown to Alicedale with sister engine 3340, class 19D 2753 has had its tender topped up with coal and has been turned on the turntable, ready to move off to the water column. Due to cramped space both Alicedale and Grahamstown had turntables. 24th September, 1987.
150. While class 19D's 2753 and 3340 are readied for the return trip from Alicedale to Grahamstown with the mid-morning mixed, a pair of class 34 diesels are passing by on the main line in the background, heading towards Port Elizabeth with what appears to be one of those local pick-ups with passenger accommodation that were not shown in the SAR time-table. The turntable pit is just visible behind the tender of 3340, at the end of the spur leading from the coalstage. 24 September 1987.
We sign off with this beauty from Dennis depicting the westbound mixed leaving Cold Spring. It came to us too late to be included in its proper geographical slot but never mind, as a sunset scene that can never be repeated it is an appropriate one with which to close off this chapter. Those of you who are still here: we thank you for sticking with us.
Well that's it for this edition folks. Phew! Don't miss the next exciting episode of SoAR which will feature the last of the Cape Midland branches that we have not yet dealt with, namely Somerset East, Kirkwood and Alexandria and will conclude our coverage of the Cape Midland System.