The Narrow Gauge Railway Museum, Tywyn - February 19, 2019
Baguley Locomotive 774.
The following description is from the Narrow Gauge Museum web site:
Between February and April 1919, Baguley (Cars) Ltd built six 2ft-gauge petrol locomotives for the Board of Trade, Timber Supply Department to be used on timber tramways in various parts of the country. The design was by McEwan Pratt & Co. and these engines were the first locomotives built by Baguleys. They were given works numbers 774-79. At 20hp, they were a larger version of the 10hp locomotives previously made by McEwan Pratt.
No. 774 was delivered to Machynlleth in March 1919 and is believed to have worked on a forestry line at Pennal, which had been completed in January that year.
It was re-purchased by Baguley in 1923 and exhibited at the Commercial Motor Show, London in the same year being given a special display livery which it carried until recent times. In 1924 it was shown on the Drewery stand at the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley.
January 1927 saw it sold to the Oakley Slate Quarries in Blaenau Ffestiniog, where it worked until 1939, and was known by the name “Clifford”. It was then stored, walled up in a disused slate mill, until 1966 when Rodney Weaver bought it for preservation. It was moved to Brian Goodchild’s railway at Leamington Spa in 1968, before being sold to R. P. Morris in 1970, moving to Bampton, Oxfordshire in 1973 and then Longfield, Kent before returning to Wales in 1977. It became part of the Narrow Gauge Railway Centre display at Gloddfa Ganol Mountain Tourist Centre.
When the Gloddfa Ganol collection closed, the engine was sold to the Trust in February 1998.
