This year's Branch Line Gala Weekend at The Bluebell Railway in May will have a distinctly Great Western theme with GWR Pannier Tank No. 7714 joining the already-announced GWR Pannier Tank No. 1369 and Manor Class No. 7812 Erlestoke Manor.
The weekend's events will be held from Friday 10th to Sunday 12th May, with some of the railway's own fleet joining the guest locomotives.
GWR Pannier Tank No. 7714 will be visiting the Bluebell from The Severn Valley Railway. It was built in 1930 by Kerr Stuart at Stoke-on-Trent. and was originally based around the Birkenhead area. In December 1958 it was transferred to Wrexham where it remained until being withdrawn from service in January 1959.
Instead of being scrapped, 7714 was sold to the National Coal Board for use at the Penallta Colliery near Rhymney in South Wales., but because of the tight curves of the track, it was unsuitable for colliery use and was used for spare parts to keep other engines running.
In 1973, the locomotive was purchased by the Severn Valley Railway, and after a long and extensive overhaul, it made its debut in preservation in 1992. It provided sterling service until 2009 when it was withdrawn again for a general overhaul. That took until 2016 when 7714 once more started hauling trains on the Severn Valley Railway.
Fellow Pannier Tank No. 1369 has a short wheelbase, which made it ideal for working the branch lines of Devon and Cornwall and for working trains on the Weymouth Quay tramway system.
In November 1964 it would become the sole survivor of the class when it was withdrawn from BR service and purchased by the South Devon Railway and moved to Buckfastleigh in 1965.
It took until 1996 for 1369 to be steamed again on the South Devon Railway, where it operated services until being taken out of service for overhaul in 2017.
In February 2022, 1369 was loaned out to the Gwili railway in Wales where it remained until January 2023.
The third Great Western visitor for the Gala is Manor Class No. 7812 Erlestoke Manor. This was withdrawn from British Railways service in 1965 and moved to the Barry scrap yard in South Wales, where it remained until 1974 when it was purchased by The Erlestoke Manor Fund and moved to its current home at the Severn Valley Railway.
By 1979 Erlestoke Manor was back in service and in 2016 it reached the milestone of running 100,000 miles in preservation.
