Local railway history sells for £4,100

It was full steam ahead for a piece of railway history from the area as it sold for £4,100 at a successful fine art auction in Shrewsbury.

The commemorative oak silver mounted wheel barrow and spade, presented to Mrs Dugdale of Llwyn, Llanfyllin by contractor Thomas Savin to mark her cutting the first sod of Llanfyllin Railway on Friday, September 20, 1861, went under the hammer in auctioneers Halls’ country house auction where it sold to a Mid Wales collector.

Included with the wheelbarrow and spade, which was made by Stephen Smith and William Nicholson, Duke Street, Lincoln Fields, London 1861, was a song sheet with lines composed by I. Glan Abel from the ceremony.

Llanfyllin Railway opened from Llanymynech via Llansantffraid, Llanfechain and Bryngwyn in 1863 to allow access to limestone quarries and the main line from Oswestry to Newtown. The branch line to Llanfyllin closed in 1965 under British Railway's Beeching axe.

Thomas Savin was a controversial Victorian industrial entrepreneur and former Mayor of Oswestry who went bankrupt after developing much of the Mid Wales railway system.

In 1857, he formed a partnership with David Davies to build the Vale of Clwyd Railway and the became principle contractor for many of the lines that became the Cambrian Railways. The partnership was dissolved in 1860.

He also had an interest in or worked on a number of other railways, including Corris, Kington and Eardisley and Bishop’s Castle. Savin's bankruptcy in 1866 led to the stalling of Aberystwyth and Welsh Coast Railway, which became a part of Cambrian Railways.

“Railway heritage items with this level of provenance always attract great interest from collectors and we were delighted with the price it achieved at auction,” said Jeremy Lamond, Halls’ fine art director.

PICTURE: The oak silver mounted wheel barrow and spade which sold for £4,100.