A special enamel badge commissioned by Irish voluntary heritage group Táilte Tours CLG commemorates the 75th anniversary of the last service by a Drumm battery train from Dublin to Bray.

The Drumm battery train was an innovative Irish invention. It was developed by Dr James Drumm of University College Dublin and operated services between Bray and Dublin from 1932 until 1949.

Long before Dublin’s DART network had thought of introducing environmentally friendly traction, the Drumm train ran on battery power.

Charging stations, the forerunners of today’s EV charging stations, were installed at Bray and in Dublin.

Enamel badges depicting a Drumm battery train are now available on the Táilte Tours website, with funding for the badges being raised during Táilte’s rail tours and similar events around Ireland.

The badge depicts an iconic and often-forgotten part of Irish technological history, and is sure to be popular with railway enthusiasts as well as fans of Irish history in general.

Táilte Tours CLG is named after one of Ireland’s largest steam locomotives and is a voluntary group that runs rail tours and other railway-themed events throughout Ireland to raise funds for and spread awareness about Ireland’s railway heritage.

Last July, Táilte Tours donated €1,600 worth of enamel badges that depict the original County Donegal Railway steam locomotive No.2 Blanche to Donegal Railway Heritage Centre to raise funds for the centre.

It had previously donated badges to the Downpatrick & County Down Railway and the Cavan & Leitrim Railway.

The new badge is available from the Táilte Tours website here.

“The Drumm battery train was perhaps one of the most innovative of all Irish inventions, very much laying the groundwork for electric vehicles today, yet is an often overlooked piece of Irish transport history. We tend to view EVs as a modern phenomenon, but in this train was carrying passengers between Bray and Dublin in the early 1930s, before disappearing not with a bang but a whimper in 1949. We hope our new badge goes some way towards celebrating this, depicting the train resplendent in the original Great Southern Railway livery it carried in the early 1930”.

Niall Kelly, Co-Founder & Marketing Officer of Tours CLG