| GWR 3440 City of Truro | |
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| City of Truro approaching Cheltenham Racecourse on the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway |
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| Power type | Steam |
|---|---|
| Builder | GWR Swindon Works |
| Build date | 1903 |
| Configuration | 4-4-0 |
| Gauge | 1,435 mm (4 ft 81⁄2 in) |
| Career | Great Western Railway |
| Class | 3700, City Class |
| Number | 3440, renum 3717 in 1912 |
| Official name | City of Truro |
| Retired | 1931 |
| Restored | 1957, 1984 & 2004 |
| Current owner | National Railway Museum |
Number 3440 City Of Truro is a Great Western Railway (GWR) 3700 (or 'City') Class 4-4-0 locomotive, designed by George Jackson Churchward and built at the GWR Swindon Works in 1903. (It was renumbered 3717 in 1912). It is one of the contenders for the first steam locomotive to travel in excess of 100 mph (160 km/h). Its maximum speed has been the subject of much debate over the years.
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City of Truro was timed at a speed of 102.3 mph (164 km/h) whilst hauling the "Ocean Mails" special from Plymouth to London Paddington on 9 May 1904. This speed was recorded from the train by Charles Rous-Marten, who wrote for the The Railway Magazine and other journals. Initially, mindful of the need to preserve their reputation for safety, the railway company allowed only the overall timings for the run to be put into print and Rous-Marten's article in The Railway Magazine of June 1904 did not mention the maximum speed. However the morning after the run two local Plymouth newspapers did report that the train had reached a speed between 99 and 100 miles an hour whilst descending Wellington bank in Somerset. This claim was based on the stopwatch timings of a postal worker, William Kennedy, who was also on the train.[1]
Rous-Marten first published the maximum speed in 1905, though he did not name the locomotive or railway company:
On one occasion when special experimental tests were being made with an engine having 6 ft. 8 in. coupled wheels hauling a load of approximately 150 tons behind the tender down a gradient of 1 in 90, I personally recorded a rate of no less than 102.3 miles an hour for a single quarter-mile, which was covered in 8.8 seconds, exactly 100 miles an hour for half a mile which occupied 18 seconds, 96.7 miles an hour for a whole mile run in 37.2 seconds; five successive quarter-miles were run respectively in 10 seconds, 9.8 seconds, 9.4 seconds, 9.2 seconds and 8.8 seconds. This I have reason to believe to be the highest railway speed ever authentically recorded. I need hardly add that the observations were made with the utmost possible care, and with the advantage of previous knowledge that the experiment was to be made, consequently without the disadvantage of unpreparedness that usually attaches itself to speed observations made in a merely casual way in an ordinary passenger train. The performance was certainly an epoch-making one. In a previous trial with another engine of the same class, a maximum of 95.6 miles an hour was reached.
– C Rous-Marten: p2118, Bulletin of the International Railway Congress – October 1905[2]
Before his death in 1908 Rous-Marten did name the locomotive as City of Truro. Offical confirmation from the Great Western Railway came in 1922 when they published a letter written in June 1905 by Rous-Marten to James Inglis, the General Manager, giving further details of the record.[3]
...What happened was this: when we topped the Whiteball Summit, we were still doing 63 miles an hour; when we emerged from the Whiteball Tunnel we had reached 80; thenceforward our velocity rapidly and steadily increased, the quarter-mile times diminishing from 11 sec. at the tunnel entrance to 10.6 sec., 10.2 sec., 10 sec., 9.8 sec., 9.4 sec., 9.2 sec., and finally to 8.8 sec., this last being equivalent to a rate of 102.3 miles an hour. The two quickest quarters thus occupied exactly 18 sec. for the half-mile, equal to 100 miles an hour. At this time the travelling was so curiously smooth that, but for the sound, it was difficult to believe we were moving at all...
This sequence of eight quarter-mile timings is thought to start at milepost 173, the first after the tunnel, with the maximum speed at milepost 171.
From 1922 onwards City of Truro featured prominently in the Great Western Railway's publicity material.
Doubts over the record centre on the power of the locomotive and some contradictions in Rous-Marten's passing times. However his milepost timings are consistent with a speed of 100 mph or just over. This occurred before any car or aeroplane had attained such a speed. However in May 1904 City of Truro was not the fastest vehicle in the world, as 130 mph had been reached the previous year on an experimental electric railway near Berlin.
The historical significance of City of Truro led to the locomotive's survival after withdrawal from service. The GWR's Chief Mechanical Engineer Charles Collett asked that the engine be preserved at the then-new National Railway Museum at York when she was withdrawn in 1931. It was donated to the London and North Eastern Railway and was subsequently displayed at the new museum in York.
In 1957 City of Truro was returned to service by British Railways Western Region. The locomotive was based at Didcot, and was used both for hauling special excursion trains and for normal revenue services, usually on the Newbury and Southampton branch line, and was renumbered back to 3440. She was withdrawn for a second time in 1961. She was taken to Swindon's GWR Museum in 1962 where she stayed until 1984, when she was restored for the GWR's 150th anniversary celebrations the following year. After that she returned to the National Railway Museum from where she was occasionally used on main line outings. She made a guest appearance in an exhibition called National Railway Museum on Tour which visited Swindon in 1990.
Her latest restoration to full working order was undertaken in 2004, at a cost of £130,000, to mark the 100th anniversary of her record-breaking run, and the loco has subsequently hauled several trains on UK main lines.
For some years now the National Railway Museum has permitted City of Truro to be based semi-permanently at the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway, where she can often be seen hauling trains between Toddington and Cheltenham Racecourse. However she frequently leaves her Toddington base to visit other UK heritage railways.
City of Truro featured as a character in the book Duck and the Diesel Engine, part of The Railway Series by the Rev. W. Awdry. The loco has also appeared in the television spin-off Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends, and was released as a diecast model in the Ertl range.
City of Truro starred in the 1957-8 serial "Will o'the Whistle" in the D.C.Thomson comic The Wizard, where it was used by resistance fighters after the Kushanti invasion of Britain.
No. 999, another contender for the first steam locomotive to reach 100 mph.
Andrews, David (2008). "Special Experimental Tests: more pieces of the City of Truro puzzle". Backtrack (Pendragon Publishing) 22 (2): 116–121.
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