GWR County class 4-6-0 No 1003 County of Wilts passes Whiteball Siding with the 10.05am Kingswear to Wolverhampton train on August 18, 1962.

Peter Kerslake says "1003 "County of Wilts" had been one of Shrewsbury's allocation of the "County" class in the mid 'fities so would have been well used to working down here to the West of England on the "North to West" rosters at that time, and it makes a fine study here at Whiteball now heading towards Taunton and onwards to Wolverhampton in August of 1962.
Introduced in 1945 the "Counties" came as a disappointment to many as rumours of a new design of large passenger locomotive turned out to be nothing more than a standard 4-6-0 resembling a "Hall" and constituting the final development from the "Saint" class of 1902.
Restricted in maximum speed over many G.W.R. lines due to their weight and an unfortunate tendency to creat a "Hammer Blow" effect on the tracks , the "Counties" were useful "Maids of all Work", however, with the thirty in the class being housed at no fewer than eight Motive Power Depots in 1956, ranging from Shrewsbury and Chester in the north to Neyland in South Wales and as far west as Penzance.
"County of Wilts" seen here was one of the first three condemned in 1962 with 1011 "County of Chester" outliving all its classmates until 1964."


Photo: M.J. Fox/Rail Archive Stephenson