Classic Locos series finally runs out of puff

The last in the Classic Locomotives series of miniature sheets, featuring Welsh railways, will be released on February 20.

Its four stamps illustrate two engines pulling passenger trains and two in industrial use; the earliest railways in Wales were built for industrial purposes, serving collieries and smelting works.

The sheet border has a background image of the British Railways class 5101 No4126 locomotive hauling a passenger train across the Crumlin Viaduct in Monmouthshire, which was the third highest railway viaduct in the world but was dismantled in 1967.

Designed by Delaney Design Consultants, the sheet is printed in litho by the Cartor division of International Security Printers. It follows similar sheets featuring the historic locomotives of England in 2011, Scotland in 2012 and Northern Ireland in 2013.

VERDICT

COMMEMORATIVE WORTH  

The railways were key to the industrial growth of Wales, but this is merely a thematic series

QUALITY OF DESIGN  

The designers have hunted out good historical images, but there’s little creativity involved

WOW FACTOR  

Other than railway fanatics, few will be sorry to see the brakes put on this   series, which springs few surprises

1st class LMS 2F No7720

The London, Midland & Scottish loco is shown leaving Britannia Bridge, over the Menai Strait, at the head of a Bangor-to-Holyhead passenger train, around 1930.

78p Hunslet No589 Blanche

Built by the Hunslet Engine Co in Leeds, Blanche is photographed on The Cob, an embankment built as part of a land reclamation project in the Glaslyn estuary near Porthmadog, on the Ffestiniog Railway in 1964.

88p W&LLR No822 The Earl

The Welshpool & Llanfair Light Railway’s workhorse The Earl waits patiently on Union Street in Welshpool, Powys, while a car is pushed off the line.

£1.28 BR 5600 No5652

The British Railways locomotive heads a coal train at Cwmbargoed, near Merthyr Tydfil, in 1959, on a line which is still used to transport coal to Aberthaw Power Station on the South Glamorgan coast near Barry.

OTHER PRODUCTS

In the presentation pack, railway historian David Gwyn recounts the history of steam locomotives in Wales. A first day cover and stamp cards are also available. 

PRICES

Miniature sheet    £3.54

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