Morchard Road To Crediton Railway 1930

A Memory of Down St Mary.

From 1935 to 1941 I was a pupil at Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School Crediton, travelling every day by train from Morchard Road Station, leaving home at ten minutes past eight to board the eight thirty train to Crediton, to walk up to the school at the top of the town, I must have walked between three and four miles every day. Children cycled down from Morchard Bishop to catch the train every day leaving their bikes at the Sturt Arms, one of the boys Lou Richards who was a year or so older than me, went on to be a bomber pilot had a bad crash in a Wellington Bomber, was in hospital for six months than went on to pilot Lancaster Bombers doing a total of thirty three operations, the longer you went on the less likely you were to get shot down, I suppose experience came into it as the whole crew gained experience, I believe Lou was a squadron leader at the end of the war, He said he felt so sorry for some crews, first time up and they were shot down. I have not heard any thing about Lou for a year or so if he is still around I do not know. Joe Gunn from the Sturt Arms married Lou's sister Gladys, he was a spitfire pilot during the war. A season ticket for one term (twelve to thirteen weeks) cost twenty eight to thirty shillings; we always had two reserved compartments and the High School girls one next to the guards van. Q.E.S. boys attended school on Saturday mornings, we had to catch the one thirty from Crediton, it was a corridor train, in the summer it would be packed with holiday makers, we would be standing in the corridor, double headed , it would split at Yeoford, the first engine would uncouple and move away then the second engine would move away with the first half of the train leaving the North Devon Line at Coleford junction for the Plymouth line, there was a signal box at Coleford junction at this time. The first engine would then return to couple up to the remaining coaches then take the North Devon Line at Colefort Junction. From Coleford Junction for about a mile I should think, there was a slight incline and trains would fair go after leaving Yeoford station to help them up the incline, Copplestone station is the highest point between Barnstaple and Exeter 350ft above sea level. I am sure along the next srction we could look down and see Copplestone House the home of Mrs Pope, there were also lovely rhododendrons beside the track. Often when we came to catch the eight thirty in the morning there would be two goods trains in the station, quite long trains with a guards van attached to the rear, it was quite a heavy vehicle, 25 tons the guard had to be prepared to apply the handbrake on long descending gradiants to assist the locomotive with braking; hence the need for such a heavy vehicle at the raar, with a stove inside, the guard could regularly check that the train was in good order by looking along its lenght from a seat on the inside on each side of the van through small pertruding windows. The one from Exeter would be backed up into the siding to Blackmores slaughterhouse the Barnstaple goods backed up into the goods yard siding. The train drivers, firemen and guards would change over which meant the team from Barnstaple would take the Exeter goods on to Barnstaple and the Exeter crew the Barnstaple goods back to Exeter. I have seen the fire man wash off his shovel and fry their breadfast over the engine fire. Goods trains had the older engines, if they had a heavy load, when moving away, if the driver opened the throttle a little to much the driving wheels would spin, quickly close the throttle, wait a few seconds, then open the throttle very very slighly, give one puff just to get the load moving then slowly moving away. N 2-6-0s or N2-4-0s, which I believe they where called, were coupled to the passenger trains.
I remember, it must have been during the 1950s, looking from the farm access bridge which trains had to pass underneath watching the evening goods from Barnstaple to Exeter, watching the evening goods from Barnstaple to Exeter, which came through every evening as it came tawards me from Morchard Road I counted 56 wagons hauled by a Battle of Britain Class Engine 4-6-2, Ninety to One hundred tons in weight. I would say at this time of day once it left Barnstaple it dit not stop until it reached Exeter, the marshalling yards at St David's no doubt. In the 1930,s the boundary fences which consisted of low banks with a thorn hedge on top were replaced by wire fencing as we have today, sides and banks were kept cut to minimise fires during dry periods also one fork width would be turned over against the fence to act as a fire break. I remember one August bamk holiday Monday afternoon, a passenger train leaving Morchard Road station for Copplestone, no doubt heavily laden, when passing Woolsgrove threw out a coal into the field (Long Close by name) of standing wheat burning about two acres. Today the banks and verges are not cut, as diesel electric cars pose no fire risk.
Henry Shapland 14/06/10

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