Off the Rails by A.G. Coombes

First published in issue 78 of The Tenterden Terrier Spring 1999
Reproduced with permission of then-editor Mr P D Shaw

Sir – The “Off The Rails” article (Summer edition of “The Tenterden Terrier”) and the derailment of Terrier 32678 made interesting reading, both as to the cause and the subsequent recovery operation, with some splendid photographs of the latter. However I think the running number of the derailed carriage, given as “5317” must be in error as this was a SE&CR Lavatory Composite that was withdrawn in 1940. The K&ESR carriage was confirmed as L&SWR origin and was one of the four brake corridor seconds working the line at this period, viz. S3093, S3121, S3170 and S3171. It is possible that it could have been either S3170 or S3171 and wrongly written up as “S317” with the S transposed as a 5 and the fourth figure omitted. S3175 was also a L&SWR corridor brake in the K&ESR service but appears to have been on the line from 1950 onwards so this vehicle can be eliminated. If in fact it was either S3170 or S3171 it obviously left the line for repair (Ashford?) and returned to service for another nine months or so before withdrawal; in the case of S3170 by 31/12/49 and S3171 a bit later in October 1950.