GWR Castle 4-6-0 No 7017 G.J.Churchward with the 10.15am Paddington-Bristol at Swindon on 4 May 1958.

Peter Kerslake says Two mysteries here as that "03 " Reporting Number is a bit strange for a scheduled working from Paddington to Bristol and who are all those chaps on the platform (there is nothing on Six Bells)?

This has all the looks of being a special working.7017 was allocated to Old Oak Common at this time, its first shed from new in August 1948 and its last when withdrawn in February 1963.


Photo: K.L. Cook / Rail Archive Stephenson