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Passchendaele Pichi Richi Railway, Quorn |
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BHAS shunter ‘Passchendaele’ on display at the Homestead
Park Pioneer Museum, Port Augusta on 24 November 2006.
This photo was kindly contributed by Marc
Hryciuk.
Passchendaele moved to the Pichi Richi Railway, Quorn in
2019.
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Builder |
Kilmarnock,
Scotland |
|
Builder’s Number & Year |
1546 of 1919 |
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Wheel Arrangement |
0-6-0T |
The Broken Hill
Associated Smelters (BHAS) were established in 1889 to process the silver, lead
and zinc ore delivered from the rich mines at Broken Hill, NSW. The ore was
railed from Broken Hill via the 3’ 6” gauge routes of the Silverton Tramway to
the NSW border at Cockburn, and then onwards to Port Pirie by the South
Australian Railways. BHAS established an internal railway network at the Port
Pirie smelter to receive and transfer the ore into their refinery, together
with lines for slag disposal, wharves and general transport. Four locomotives
were supplied by Andrew Barclay Sons & Co of Kilmarnock, Scotland, a
leading builder of industrial locomotives. Delivered shortly after the end of World
War 1, the four locos were named after significant battles on the Western Front
in which the Australian Infantry Force fought - Pozieres, Polygon, Peronne and
Passchendaele. Interestingly, three were 15-ton units with 10” x 18” cylinders
while the fourth ‘Pozieres’ was somewhat heavier with larger 12” x 20”
cylinders.
It seems the
larger version with 12” x 20” cylinders proved more useful, and in 1928 one of
the 10” x 18” locos – Polygon – was replaced by a new 12” loco named ‘Port
Pirie’. Polygon was sold to New Guinea Copper Mines Ltd in 1927 and exported to
their mining operation at Bootless Bay, east of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.
To my knowledge it is the only steam locomotive to have worked in PNG, and alas
it was scrapped in 1961 – becoming the only one of the five BHAS steam locos
not to survive into preservation. The five were:
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Name |
Builder’s No. |
Notes & Disposal |
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Andrew Barclay b/n 1543 of 1918 |
Cylinders 12” x 20” Statically displayed at Puffing
Billy – Menzies Creek Museum. To Bellarine Railway in 2010 and returned
to service. |
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Polygon |
Andrew Barclay b/n 1544 of 1918 |
15-ton, Cylinders 10” x 18” Replaced by ‘Port Pirie’ and sold
in 1927. Worked at Bootless Bay, Port
Moresby PNG. Scrapped 1961 |
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Andrew Barclay b/n 1545 of 1919 |
15-ton, Cylinders 10” x 18” Statically displayed at Mile End
Railway Museum (ARHA SA). Returned to service for National
Railway Museum, Port Adelaide. |
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Passchendaele |
Andrew Barclay b/n 1546 of 1919 |
15-ton, Cylinders 10” x 18” Initially placed in Risdon Park,
Port Pirie. Later moved to Homestead Park
Pioneer Museum, Port Augusta. Transferred to Pichi Richi
Railway, Quorn in 2019. |
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Andrew Barclay b/n 1955 of 1928 |
Cylinders 12” x 20” Displayed at National Trust (Old
Station) Museum, Port Pirie |
A guidebook
to the newly established Mile End Railway Museum, published in 1974, describes
‘Peronne’ exhibited there with commentary that the first four BHAS locomotives
had been acquired as war surplus. This claim was repeated in a later guidebook
“On Shed at Mile End” published in 1980; presumably the years of manufacture
and naming of these locomotives gave rise to this view. (Indeed, I also
repeated this claim in an earlier version of this web page.) Subsequent
research by Richard Horne (as published in a letter to Light Railways magazine,
as referenced below) has now established from Barclay’s records that the four
original locomotives were ordered new by BHAS and had no connection to the war
effort, although their construction and delivery was delayed by the conflict.
A diesel hydraulic loco
was acquired by BHAS in 1961 and took over all shunting duties, the slag lines
having already been converted to truck haulage in 1941. The remaining BHAS
steam locomotives were deemed surplus around 1964 but fortunately each found
homes in preservation. Passchendaele was originally plinthed in a school
playground at Port Pirie, later being donated to the Pichi Richi Railway
Preservation Society Inc (PRRPS).
In the late 1980’s the
PRRPS sought to acquire ex-Commonwealth Railways locomotive NM25 which, at that time, was a static exhibit at the
Homestead Park Pioneer Museum in Port Augusta, and a swap was agreed with Port
Augusta City Council whereby NM25 was exchanged for Passchendaele and an
ex-ETSA diesel locomotive. Accordingly, NM25 left for Quorn in 1990, being
replaced by Passchendaele which became a static exhibit at Homestead Park, as
seen in the photo above.
Some 28 years later
circumstances changed again, and in April 2018 Passchendaele was donated back
to PRRPS by Port Augusta City Council. The little loco had arrived at the PRRPS
base in Quorn by 2019, where I understand it is awaiting its turn for restoration.
This is not the first BHAS shunter to arrive in Quorn, as sister ‘Peronne’
visited the Pichi Richi Railway in 1988 when it was tested and commissioned for
traffic following restoration.
References
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a |
National
Railway Museum website, collections page ‘Peronne’ retrieved
21 January 2022. |
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b |
Bellarine Railway website, ‘Our Trains’
page retrieved 21 January 2022. |
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c |
Information
provided by D. Price via emails dated
27 January 2011, 26 July 2011 & 28 December 2021. |
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f |
Wilson,
J. ‘The Mile End Railway Museum - the first ten years’ Published by the Australian
Railway Historical Society (SA Division) Inc., 1974 ISBN
0909970092 |
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g |
Fluck,
R. E. & Samson, R. ‘On Shed at Mile End’ Published by the Australian
Railway Historical Society (SA Division) Inc., 1980 ISBN
0959507302 |
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h |
'Light Railways - Australia's Magazine of
Industrial & Narrow-Gauge Railways', Number
265, February 2019. Letters (page 28) ‘WW1
Surplus and Memorialised Locomotives’ by Richard Horne. Published
by Light Railway Research Society of Australia Inc. |
Page updated: 2 February 2022
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