My name is Bill Moore and I will be writing about my life on Britains railways with 46 years experience as a Cleaner, Fireman, Driver & finally as a Drivers Standards Manager.
Mothers are always right!
I was born in Bournemouth in 1945 when it was still part of Hampshire until Dorset Stole it in 1974. My first introduction to railways was when my Mother used to take me as a three & four year old down to fisherman’s walk which overlooked the railway cutting just outside Pokesdown station so I could watch the trains go by as she got on with her knitting. Of course as a four year old I said I wanted to be an engine driver when I grow up, to this she replied that by the time I was old enough to drive all the steam engines would be gone.
In the 1960’s you had to be 23 years old to be passed out to drive any type of train, so although I had the seniority to be passed out I was not old enough to do so, which meant firing to drivers junior in service to me. I was not a happy bunny.
I was 23 in May of 1968 so I applied for a driver’s position at Waterloo, having passed the rules exam & the electric traction course I was appointed as a driver on August 12th 1968. My Mother was right of course as British Railways finished with main line steam on 11th August 1968.
My experience which may be of some interest to you is that I fired through the last years of steam on the southern, and then drove most of the southern railways pre-war electrics, plus the post war E.P.s “Kent Coasters” V.E.P. C.I.G., 508, 455 units, being at Waterloo I was also trained on the Waterloo & City known to railwaymen as the “rat hole” or the “Gunge”. Later as a driver at Woking I drove class 08s 09s 350 shunters, class 33, 47, 73 locos, R.E.P.’s and T.C.s. Finally learning the 458, 444 & 450 units.
To put a different prospectus on railways I am a life member of the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway having worked on the track since 1970, proving if nothing else that beer and sweat always seem to go together, only when you are off duty these days of course.
If I can be of any assistance to you in answering any questions please E mail me on this website, and I will try to answer them. If I can’t I probably know a man who can.
I look forward to hearing from you Bill Moore.
