The LNER Encyclopedia

sandwhich wrote:Well done Stevie G. Thats put us all in our place as regards Huntingdon-Holme.

Didn't think anyone needed 'puttting in their place'!
My view was just that, with that sort of info. to hand, why not share it? Hope it's been useful.

Micky wrote:Something keeps telling me that there was a red miniture arm on a medium straight post that took a train off the down goods line at Holme instead of a ground disc signal but it was 43 years ago and i never use to get that far down the G.N. main line that often.

Although the further north one goes from Hitchin, the less I tend to know of how the old signalling was, I'm pretty sure you're right about there being a 'miniature' arm at Holme, reading off the end of the second Down track onto the Down Main; some way back from the points as I recall - at least 100 yards I'd guess.

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Sorry Stevie G if my remark sounded a bit patronising, I certainly did not mean it that way. Your post certainly brought back some memories of years past.
On another memory of yesteryear was of two signal boxes between Gasworks and Copenhagen Tunnels just north of Kings Cross called Belle Isle (for up workings) and Copenhagen (for down workings) both closed in 1966, but older photos show a third box at the north end of Gasworks Tunnel which must have closed many years before. I wonder what it was called.

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Micky wrote:

sandwhich wrote:On another memory of yesteryear was of two signal boxes between Gasworks and Copenhagen Tunnels just north of Kings Cross called Belle Isle (for up workings) and Copenhagen (for down workings) both closed in 1966, but older photos show a third box at the north end of Gasworks Tunnel which must have closed many years before. I wonder what it was called.

It was Belle Isle DOWN s/box. I would have loved to have know what the official 'walking route' to the box was because it was situated just outside Gasworks tunnel in a cutting (Belle Isle) between the down slow & down main no.2 lines on one side of the box and the down main no.1 & up relief lines on the other side of the box not to mention the up fast & up slow lines as well!.

All in all a bit of a hazardous s/box to reach i would have thought?.

(No offence taken sandwhich.)

Think I once read somewhere that B.I.Down closed in '35, with control of its pointwork, protected by new colour-light signals, then transferred to the then new-ish (about 3 years) King's Cross 'power' signal box.

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You could be right Mickey, it was a long time ago. As regards walking routes to signal boxes, some of these locations looked a bit hairy to get there to say the least. To get to Belle Isle and Copenhagen Jcn boxes the signalmen would have to cross running lines to get there.

...just an ordinary part of everyday railway working life then; and not one piece of orange clothing in sight!

I can only think that sole access was via 'the Goods Yard'(/Top Shed) in some way, as it remained for getting to Goods & Mineral Box into the early '70s : - .... at least, I wouldn't have fancied walking through a working tunnel from 'the Cross' or Holloway in those days !

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Walking across the Kings Cross Goods Yard to get to Belle Isle and Copenhagen Jcn boxes must have been a bit hairy with all the light engine movements to and from Top Shed as well as shunt and train movements especcially on a foggy day.
There is something I was told about the Goods & Mineral Signal Box which closed in 1975. It was at one time manned by two signalmen who were a special grade because they did no booking, I know this was long ago but it would be interesting if someone could confirm if this was true.

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Dave Fox, who resided in the hostel at Ilford the same time as me was in Bell Isle box for at least 5 years in the early 60s, and he always walked through the goods yard and 5 arch. As did John Butler, who was in Copenhagen Junction box for a while, before he got a move to Holloway North Up box.

[ I met and worked with Dave F. for several years when I moved to Liverpool Street, JeffB : Initially on a March Thursday in 1989, in the old signal box there on its last full day working (the 23rd if I remember correctly), and when we moved across the lines to the new IECC signal control centre from then onwards until moving on in 1995.]

sandwhich wrote:Walking across the Kings Cross Goods Yard to get to Belle Isle and Copenhagen Jcn boxes must have been a bit hairy with all the light engine movements to and from Top Shed as well as shunt and train movements especcially on a foggy day.
There is something I was told about the Goods & Mineral Signal Box which closed in 1975. It was at one time manned by two signalmen who were a special grade because they did no booking, I know this was long ago but it would be interesting if someone could confirm if this was true.

I never heard that one sandwhich, though neither can I say that it was never so.

By late 1968 when I first visited G&M, the Goods Yard certainly had its busy periods, but already also long periods of nothing happening in the box; e.g. for a little more than an hour, to my knowledge.
So there was (unsurprisingly) just the one signalman per shift, and normal Train Register Book-ing was done then.
But even at busy times in that period, there was not much booking to be done in proportion to the total workload as the nature of the place was that a lot of the work did not involve signalling the Block Sections, (the Up & Down Goods from/to the Holloway South boxes, The "Down South London Goods" connecting line rising from Gasworks Tunnel [with King's Cross Box], and the N.London Incline [using a 'One Engine in Steam' Train Staff] was worked with the St.Pancras Sidings Shunter but which in any case was seemingly only done by telephone [no block bell/instrumentation] ).
Instead at least half the work was involved in dealing with the one '350'(hp: - Class 08) pilot loco making long shunts on, or shunting between, the main 'reception'("Arrival")/"Departure"/other roads that led into/out of the main 'goods yard', or either way between those roads and 'the North Yard' (Nos. 3 to 12 Arch sidings [except No.9, occupied by the line which headed up and over Cop.Tunnel to the 'Caledonian Coal Yard' beside the NL line] ), sited on the north side of where King's Cross 'Top Shed' loco depot had been; plus the remaining freight traffic from/to the north, and Temple Mills, a few local light engine moves coming in only to reverse and head north again (e.g. Finsbury Park Carriage Sidings - Fins.Pk. depot), and also the occasional freight via 'the Incline' between the North London line and 'the North Yard'.

In better days there was the short connecting line down towards Copenhagen Tunnel (to Copenhagen Junction Box : line known locally [by the signalmen at least] as 'the Lickey' owing to its steepness) used by locos from Top Shed heading down to King's Cross station, and although I'm unsure how this was worked between G&M and CJ, G&M had a relese lever for CJ's points connecting this line with the Down Slow, so I suspect that it was rather like the long 'ladder' or 'through' crossovers jointly-worked between two boxes, such as at Holloway North, which were worked using an 'Interlocking bell' only; no block instrument.

The nearest thing to the 'two signalmen and no booking' story, that I heard of was that, in the days of much higher levels of goods traffic, more than one pilot loco shunting all the time (up to six, according to who it was that was relating how things used to be, and how long previously they were speaking of), and all the loco comings and goings to/from 'Top shed', I was assured that G&M was the only box in the whole London area where the (one) signalman was assisted in working the box by the telegraph lad, and this necessity, though perhaps not formally authorised, was recognised by not being challenged or forbidden when District Inspectors (signalling) visited.

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