Reviews 171

The Atock /Attock Family, A worldwide Railway Engineering Dynasty, Ernie Shepherd, Oakwood Press, 2009, A5, 264pp, illustrations, softback. ISBN 978 0 85361 6818. £15.95.

Our late lamented member Bob Clements inspired this book and the author acknowledges this in his dedication: - “without whose inspiration it would most likely never have seen the light of day”.

But from the pen of our member Ernie Shepherd, it illuminates and traces four generations and 13 members of the Atock family in the railway industry spanning some 130 years. They served the industry not only in Ireland and England but also worldwide. Martin Atock was locomotive carriage and wagon superintendent of the Waterford & Limerick Railway, 1861-1872, and for 28 years to 1900 with the MGWR. Even at the dawn of the diesel era we find an Atock, Martin Oldacres Attock, at the heart of the industry, with English Electric, designing main locomotives and railcars for British and overseas railways.

Further members of the family led exciting lives apart from the railways and the author records these in the periods of the two World Wars, in which a number of family members played their part. Mention is also made of the Atock rocket experiments in Australia in the 1930s!

Of the 162 illustration some 23 are specifically Irish and include photos by Fayle, Coakham, Clements and Seán Kennedy, and from family collections. One of the earliest known Irish railway photographs is reproduced on p.40.

This book really forms part of a series of Oakwood Press Railway Bibliographies or rather Biographies which include locomotive greats like Drummond, Webb and Thompson. It is therefore more a family biography than a railway history but none the less loses none of its charm for railway historians, because it is always interesting to read about the people and personalities behind the machines and industry.

The author has done his work well. This book has all the required academic requirements: appendices, footnotes, bibliography and an index. It is to be recommended. TM

Locomotive Compendium – Ireland, Colin Boocock: Ian Allan, 2009, A4, xxxpp, illustrations, hardback. ISBN xxx £19.99

Colin Boocock, a professional railway engineer, is not unknown to those with an interest in Irish railway matters. Through his previous works – Irish Railway Album (Ian Allan, 1968) and Irish Railways: 40 Years of Change (Atlantic Publishers, 1997) – he has combined his own photographic record of Irish railway subjects with that of other notable photographers to provide useful pictorial records. His latest offering follows the same pattern and is to be commended for the quality of black & white and colour photographs that have been selected to illustrate the various classes of locomotives described in the text.

The 60-year period covered commences in 1949, co-incidentally the same year in which Ian Allan published the 2nd edition of The ABC of Irish Locomotives, which is given pride of place at the head of the bibliography in this present work. The author has generally avoided the time-honoured tradition of attributing design of locomotives to the relevant heads of locomotive departments; rightly preferring to give them credit for ‘overseeing’ or ‘specifying’ the design – a more accurate reflection of the role of these eminent mechanical engineers. However, he has throughout the text adopted the British modern traction style of class designation with the term ‘class’ preceding the particular class identity, an arrangement not used for steam or diesel locomotives in Ireland. Hence the CIÉ Metrovick diesel-electrics, for example, are incorrectly referred to as ‘Class A’ and ‘Class C’, rather than ‘A Class’ or ‘C Class’.

Furthermore, the text suffers from an obvious lack of pre-publication scrutiny by a person well-informed in Irish railway matters. There is also an amount of repetition between the text and captions, and the proof reading appears to have missed quite a number of inconsistencies. The result is rather unfortunate in that an otherwise fine presentation is marred by an unacceptable level of factual error and some obvious contradictions. Space does not permit an exhaustive account of the many errors that appear in the text, but it is worth pointing out that a total of 27 (and not 21) kits of parts for moguls were obtained from Woolwich (12 by the MGWR in 1923 and 15 by the GSR in 1925), and that the J4 Class 0-6-0s were a product of Maunsell’s tenure at Inchicore (not Coey) and were one of his classes that worked in CIÉ days. In regard to the GNR(I) locomotives, it should be noted that the S, S2, SG and SG2 classes were introduced to service under G.T. Glover and not Clifford (pp 67, 68 & 76). Charles Clifford had retired on 31 March 1912, well before the appearance of these classes.

The historical context is generally weak and there are too many factual errors: the GNR(I) was not simply a “merger of three older companies in 1876” (p.64). It came into being on 1 April 1876 with the amalgamation of the Northern Railway and the Ulster Railway; the Northern Railway itself being an amalgamation of the Dublin & Drogheda Railway and the Dublin & Belfast Junction Railway on 1 March 1875; and was joined by the Irish North Western Railway from 1 January 1876. The WL&WR was absorbed in 1901 (not 1904) and the D&SER was a change of title for the DW&WR in 1907 (not an incorporation in 1906). Neither did the D&SER own the whole route from Amiens Street to Rosslare Harbour (p.37), the Amiens Street – Westland Row and Wexford North – Rosslare Harbour sections belonged to other companies; nor did permanent arrangements for through working of boat trains from Dublin to Rosslare Harbour commence on a regular basis until 1925 under the GSR. Woolwich 2-6-0s were not permitted to work south of Westland Row due to axle-load restrictions and only appeared at Rosslare via the F&RR&H route from Waterford.

The author asserts on p.14 that the GS&WR 400 Class (which he incorrectly credits in the caption to the photograph on p.6 to J.R. Bazin rather than E.A.A. Watson) were originally designed with inside valve gear “in the style of the GWR Star Class”, and cites an early photograph. Such a new revelation (if factual) requires further positive substantiation as does the statement that the two D&SER Beyer Peacock 2-6-0s were delivered in a dark green livery. In summary, this publication is a nice pictorial record of the evolution of Irish motive power over a 60-year period, but it is not a work that can be relied on for accuracy of railway historical or locomotive facts.
GMB