ONE OF Britain’s most unusual narrow gauge lines was sold off by tender in early March, reports Tony Hoyland.

Above: Prison staff demonstrate how to tip spoil down the side of an earth bank in the 1970s.

Bidding for the narrow gauge railway equipment and line from North Sea Camp, an open prison situated on the bleakest part of Lincolnshire’s coastline, was closed on 16 March. A spokesman for sale auctioneers, Pygott & Crone, said that he was delighted with the response from the mainly private enthusiasts and commented that there had been around 100 people attend the viewing days prior to the sale.
The prison was originally a Borstal boys’ camp founded in 1935 in the days of the ‘Grow for Britain’ campaign. The inmates, a ready supply of labour, not only set about constructing their own detention centre but also began the reclamation of 600 acres of farmland from the sea. The mammoth task of building a sea wall and a network of dykes to hold back the tides was supported by the introduction of a 2ft gauge tramway system.

Originally, lengths of portable track were laid in place along the construction sites allowing the Borstal boys to push the tubs along by hand. The railway soon spread out over the marshes and reclaimed fens, with a line running for three miles from the North Sea Camp to Freiston Shore. The work continued for generations as the inmates pushed back the sea walls still further aided by the depositing of further sediment by the tides, which raised the level of the salt marsh further.
Eventually, manpower gave way to modern traction methods with the introduction of four-wheeled Lister diesel locomotives. A network of sidings and workshops sprang up with further branch lines heading out to new reclamation sites where even more track would be laid.

The line’s rolling stock consisted of hand-operated tipper wagons with some chassis converted to carry winches and water pumps. The railway was in use until the 1970s but by 1988, when the ‘Borstal boys’ tag was dropped and the camp became an adult prison, the railway had fallen into disrepair as much of the hauling of spoil and mud from the coast had been replaced by a dragline. Operations finally ceased when the fine balance between land and sea had been reached making the prospect of further reclamation untenable.
A revival plan in the 1980s was instigated by a former camp governor who, as part of the plan, had carriages built on the four-wheel chassis of the old tipper wagons. This effort failed but the plywood-bodied carriages have survived to form one of the lots in the sale.

Above: As reclamation work continued, the light track work enabled more lines to be set up easily.

A last ditch attempt was made to save the line in 2002 by the then governor Keith Beaumont, a staunch tram enthusiast and former member of the Welshpool & Llanfair Light Railway, who tried to resurrect the line as a tourist attraction. But this plan was also to no avail, and finally the authority decided to offer the 26 lots for sale as the result of ongoing asset rationalisation.
Tender for the equipment, which formed 26 lots, included a Lister 24in gauge single-cylinder PH1 diesel loco; three Lister loco chassis; stillage with 11 point levers and other track parts; 160 lengths of 24in narrow gauge railway track; a quantity of single rails; six personnel carriers; Ace winch; flat deck trucks; British Hoist & Crane Co Ltd winch with twin-cylinder Petter AV2 engine; Petter PH1 1500hp engine; 10in Wynnes pump with Petter twin-cylinder engine; brass serial plate; three Prison Commission vehicle logs; a collection of rail signage and a half-mile of narrow gauge track still in situ – for buyer to remove!

End of the On-line article.
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