GWR 7812 ‘Erlestoke Manor’ will spend the 2024 summer season away from its base at the Severn Valley Railway (SVR). Just as it did last year, the West Somerset Railway will hire it under an agreement between the SVR and the Erlestoke Manor Fund.

Erlestoke Manor returned to operation at the SVR over the recent festive period and will feature in the Railway’s Winter Gala this weekend (6 and 7 January). It will visit the Bluebell Railway for its Branch Line Gala Weekend on 10-12 May, and will then travel to the West Somerset Railway (WSR), where it will remain until the end of October.

The Erlestoke Manor Fund (EMF), founded in 1973, raised money and bought first Erlestoke Manor in 1974 and then 7802 Bradley Manor in 1979. They had been at Woodham’s scrapyard in Barry, South Wales, after British Railways deemed them surplus and outmoded at the end of 1965.

The Fund returned 7812 to working order in time for it to run in service in September 1979. Although it had bought 7802 intending to use it only for spare parts, the Fund decided to restore this loco to working order as well, which it completed in 1993. Both locomotives have served heritage railways since then, each covering more than one hundred thousand miles in preservation, mainly on the Severn Valley Railway.

In late 2021, the Fund acquired GWR Large Prairie 5164, which is currently in storage at Tyseley Locomotive Works.

Three Manor class locomotives are based at the SVR: 7812 Erlestoke Manor; 7802 Bradley Manor; and 7819 Hinton Manor. 7812 takes its name from the Manor at Erlestoke, a village near Devizes in Wiltshire. It entered service in the Bristol and Bath area in January 1939, and worked passenger and freight trains to destinations including Salisbury, Weymouth, Weston-super-Mare and Cardiff. After the war, 7812 was based in the South West, and often helped with long distance expresses on the infamous ‘Devon banks’.

Towards the end of 1960, Erlestoke Manor moved to the Oswestry/Shrewsbury/Cambrian area, where 7802 Bradley Manor was already based. It was previously thought that the two locos were withdrawn at Shrewsbury on 6 November 1965 and moved to Woodham’s scrapyard in June 1966. However, in November 2015, the EMF obtained evidence (a footplate diary) showing that Erlestoke Manor was still in service on 13 November 1965.

7812 Erlestoke Manor was the fifty-sixth locomotive to leave Barry for preservation. It left the scrapyard in May 1974, going first to Parkend and then to the Ashchurch preservation near Tewkesbury, which has since closed. It moved to the SVR on 23 April 1976, along with two GWR breakdown vans numbers 66 and 162 and Fruit D 92090. Restoration work began at Bewdley, where it was one of the five locomotives that took part in the ‘great boiler lift’ on 3 May 1976.

After returning to service in September 1979, the locomotive worked during 1980, but by spring 1981 it had developed boiler tube issues. Once these were resolved, it returned to service in spring 1982, making several appearances on main line rail tours before being once again withdrawn from service in late 1985 with a large crack in an old firebox weld.

7802 Bradley Manor had boiler problems in 2000, and Erlestoke Manor’s repaired boiler was switched to Bradley Manor to allow the latter to return to service quickly. A similar swap had taken place in 1948 when boiler number 14/6406 was moved from Erlestoke to Bradley following repair.

After its overhaul, Erlestoke Manor returned to service in 2008. On 26 August 2016, the loco achieved one hundred thousand miles of running in preservation, the event being commemorated with a special headboard announcing “Still going strong — 100,000 miles”.

7812 was withdrawn in late 2017 for a full overhaul and returned to service at SVR in late 2022.

Adrian Hassell, Chair of the Erlestoke Manor Fund (EMF), said, “Last year’s travels for 7812 proved a superb exercise to the mutual benefit of the Erlestoke Manor Fund, Severn Valley Railway and West Somerset Railway.

“The same situation for all three organisations applies this year, with the added arrangement that Erlestoke Manor will visit the Bluebell Railway. This will be an excellent and rare opportunity for a Manor to steam in Sussex.

“The trustees of the EMF are planning a special train on the WSR for EMF shareholders in the summer and details will be announced, as soon as available and via the Fund’s newsletter.

“It must be stressed that the SVR remains the home of the EMF, with its other Manor 7802 Bradley Manor due to return later this year and work beginning at Tyseley Locomotive Works on GWR Prairie no 5164 in the foreseeable future”.

RailAdvent’s online shop stocks several Erlestoke Manor items, including DVDs, prints and a mouse mat.