99-year old engine arrives to star at steam event
A rare steam locomotive that has never been seen in the North East before has landed at the Tanfield Railway ahead of its annual steam gala this weekend.
Dora is one of a only a handful of surviving steam locomotives built by the Bristol-based Avonside Engine Company.
It was constructed in 1927 for the British Electricity Authority’s Barton plant in Manchester and has recently been restored to original condition.
The four-wheeled saddle tank is normally based on the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway in West Yorkshire. Dora is visiting Tanfield to be part of the railway’s ‘Legends of Industry’ gala weekend. It will join six of Tanfield’s own steam locomotive fleet for one of the biggest railway events in the country between Friday, 19 and Sunday, 21 June.
Although Tyneside-based locomotive manufacturers dominated in the industries of County Durham and Northumberland, a small number of Avonside’s products did find their way to the region, including sisters of Dora. The Wallsend and Hebburn Coal Company bought no less than three in 1919 and 1920 for use in their pits on both sides of the River Tyne. While dean and Chapter Colliery in Ferryhill bought one named Angela second-hand in 1946. After the coal industry was nationalised, it also worked at Chilton Colliery and Mainsforth Colliery before being cut up for scrap at Tursdale workshops in 1963.
Avonside Engine Company could trace its roots back to 1837, when the firm was formed as Stothert, Slaughter and Company on Avon Street in Bristol. The first locomotives it built were to work on Brunel’s famous Great Western Railway and were actually designed by Bedlington-born Daniel Gooch. The business took the Avonside name in 1866 and built almost 2,000 locomotives before going into liquidation in 1935 as a result of the depression.
Although all of the north east based Avonside locomotives like Dora were scrapped, the visit will revive sights not seen for decades. Thankfully Dora escaped the cutters torch and was preserved in 1973 at the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway. Although it spent many years in the East Midlands, the locomotive was fully overhauled in 2024 and returned to the Worth Valley. The visit to Tanfield is Dora’s first trip away from Keighley since its overhaul.
Locomotives built in other parts of the country were never that common in the collieries, shipyards and works of the North East, mainly because there were so many being built locally. But occasionally local industries did turn to the likes of Avonside when they needed engines in a hurry, or when the price was favourable. Bringing Dora to the North East will give us the chance to see how Avonside locomotives compare for the first time in decades. It will also give our visitors the chance to see an Avonside saddle tank at work in County Durham for the first time since the 1960s.
The Legends of Industry gala weekend will also feature more local locomotives, like Twizell built by Robert Stephenson’s in 1891, and National Coal Board No. 49 which spent its career at Backworth Colliery in Northumberland. The line up will also include Tanfield’s Scottish-built pair of Horden and Stanley, which were both built in Kilmarnock to work in County Durham.
All of the locomotives will be working passenger trains on the three-mile long railway that runs from East Tanfield, near Stanley, to Sunniside on the outskirts of Gateshead. There will also be the chance to see demonstration freight trains and a number of other attractions during the gala weekend. Tickets can be purchased in advance or on the day, with full details of train times available on the Tanfield Railway’s website.
