Black Five 45407 The Lancashire Fusilier

LMS Stanier Class 5 4-6-0 45407 'The Lancashire Fusilier' is a LMS Stanier Class 5 4-6-0 locomotive engine built at Armstrong Whitworth in 1937. Owned by railway engineering company Riley and Son, it is one of 18 surviving Black 5 locomotives.

 

 

No. 45407 was built by Armstrong Whitworth of Scotswood, Newcastle, in 1937 for the London Midland and Scottish Railway. It was works No. 1462, one of 226 locomotives which formed the largest order ever placed with a private builder by a British railway company, worth £2.7 million.

 

One of the final Black 5s in operation, 45407 was withdrawn on 4 August 1968. Dr Peter Beet, the co-founder of Steamtown, Carnforth, with Sir Bill McAlpine, and business partner David Davis, visited Lostock Hall MPD to choose a locomotive to save, selecting No. 45407. Davis bought the locomotive for £3,300, and it became part of the Steamtown collection, where for some time it was painted in Furness Railway Indian red livery.

 

In 1974 it was bought by Paddy Smith, who returned it to lined BR mixed-traffic black. He operated the engine on various enthusiast tours, including the Settle-Carlisle Line, the Cambrian Coast Express, the Crewe to Holyhead Line; and The Jacobite between Fort William and Mallaig, where it spent three seasons in the late 1980s. After the last season in Scotland, No. 45407 was returned to Carnforth, and then moved to the East Lancashire Railway to run out the last three years of its boiler certificate.

 

In 1997 Ian Riley bought the engine, and had it overhauled at his railway engineering works, Riley and Son, Bury. The works included a new tender with greater water capacity, the fitting of air brake equipment to enable the engine to haul modern coaching stock. and the fitting of A.W.S. to comply with Railtrack’s modern Safety and Signaling requirements.
In 2010, No. 45407 underwent a rapid overhaul, which is believed to be the fastest undertaken on a mainline locomotive in preservation at just 14 weeks.