Howard Benson's posts

As a railwayman Alex was exempt from military service but that didn't mean working on the footplate was any less dangerous than serving overseas. On the home front the trains had to keep running day and night and often that meant braving the bombs of the London blitz. In November 1941 Alex vividly remembers a parachute mine that exploded near Queen's Park station. Whole streets were flattened and many people were killed leaving a local cinema. Alex was on a train returning from Blackpool which was caught up in the blast but he didn't realise the extent of the casualties until the train arrived at Euston. On a lighter note he remembers the drunk American soldier who found his way into an engine tender and how he courted the daughter of a pompous railway guard.

After about a year working in the shed at Camden Alex took his theory and practical tests to become a "passed" cleaner enabling him to work as a fireman on the footplate. His first mainline trip was on a 5XP Jubilee locomotive on an express to Manchester but he also did shunting duties on Jinty tank engines in the yards at Camden and Maiden Lane. As he gained more experience he was rostered for a morning run all the way to Carlisle via Shap, but unfortunately he didn't quite make it!

Alex Scott grew up in the 1930s a stone's throw away from Camden engine shed which was home to many of the famous steam locomotives which hauled the express trains of the London Midland & Scottish Railway. Alex became a cleaner at Camden in 1938 and quickly rose through the ranks to become a fireman and driver on the West Coast Main Line throughout the Second World War. He left the railway after the war but has been an enthusiast ever since driving trains on the Nene Valley Railway and acting as stationmaster at Sheringham on the North Norfolk Railway. Here in Part One of his story he talks about his family, growing up in Camden, and trainspotting from on top of the toilets at the Pembroke Castle pub.