35028 Clan Line

Merchant Navy 4-6-2 ‘Pacific’

The ‘Merchant Navy’ Class 4-6-2 Pacifics steam locomotives were originally ‘air smoothed’ locomotives built for the Southern Railway to a design of Oliver Bulleid from 1945. The design included a number of new ideas, including chain driven valve gear, later to be removed when the class was rebuilt by British Railways in the 1950s.

35028 ‘Clan Line’ was built at Eastleigh Works and entered service on 23 December 1948 from Bournemouth depot. 35028 was a British Railways loco, not a Southern built one and entered service in Malachite green livery, later in 1951 being repainted into the express Blue livery. In June 1953, the loco was repainted by BR into Brunswick Green livery, although is actually known as BR Loco Green.

‘Clan Line’ worked all the famous expresses, including the Golden Arrow, Night Ferry, Bournemouth Belle, Royal Wessex and the Atlantic Coast Express. Its last day of service was on Wednesday 5 July 1967 and had travelled 794,391 miles. The Merchant Navy Locomotive Preservation Society took ownership of ‘Clan Line’ on 13 August 1967 and remains today as the locomotive’s keeper. The last overhaul of Clan Line was in 2015-17 at Crewe and the locomotive can now be seen working the Belmond British Pullman around Surrey on a regular basis, with the occasional excursion to further parts of the country once or twice a year.