I was transferred from Canton Loco Shed in September 1962 to East Dock Shed. This shed had been shut for a while, and British Railways had sold it off to a scrap merchant. They then had to rent it back off this guy at an astronomical price, because Canton had been shut for steam engines, and the transition from Steam to Diesel Power wasn't going to be easy.

The Railway had in their wisdom scrapped all of the good locomotives, and we at East Dock Shed had to make do with the rubbish! So we had locomotives from all over thes system. Most of these were clapped out Midland engines. We did have a few good Great Western locos, but these were few and far between.

One loco that I do remember well though, was the LAST steam locomotive ever built. This was called "The Evening Star". It was numbered 92220 and was a 2-10-0 wheel arrangement. A very powerful beast it was too. In fact I had already cleaned this engine when it was based at Canton Sheds.

Now at East Dock, I had the opportunity to fire it out on the main line to Gloucester on the regular run it had. This was a train of 100 ton wagons loaded with petrol. We would have 10 of these tanks, plus a guards van on the rear of the train. So our weight of the train would be 1000 tons. This train went to Soho Pool in Birmingham.

One morning at East Dock Shed, they wanted some more coal wagons up in the coal stage. So the only engine that had steam inside it was the above aforementioned Evening Star.

My driver said to me... "Hey Graham! Do you want to drive the engine when we go out and get some wagons?" "YOU BET!" I said. Gosh - there was me, a 16 going on 17 year old kid, driving this almighty powerful engine, all on my own!

So then we went off the shed, stopped and reversed back into the yard, picked up 8 wagons of coal, then a bit of power on the regulator, and off we went up to the coal stage with the wagons, uncoupled them, then back over to the shed with just the engine.

I could see then why my driver wanted me to drive this beast - it was because the reversing handle on these locomotives were very stiff and cumbersome to operate.

Still, I wouldn't have missed that opportunity for the world!

Graham Williams - Cardiff - June 2007