Helmdon

[Paul Denison]

Folks,

Please accept my apologies if I'm stepping out of line with this, but just recently we have formed the Helmdon and District Heritage Railway Society with the intention of turning Helmdon GCR station into a working museum. Given that the SMJ runs underneath the GCR Viaduct just north of Helmdon GCR station we are looking at including the SMJ as part of Helmdons railway heritage.

I was wondering if anyone knows if there are any colour pictures of the SMJ Company crest which we have so far been unable to find.

I hope posting this is ok but if there are any problems please let me know.

Best wishes

Paul

[Andy Thompson]

Paul

 

Andy here - this whole site was my fault! (although I only got it going, the members have taken over that baton!)

As far as an SMJ crest goes... when I started the first version of the site - www.towcestersrailwayhistory.co.uk I too wanted a crest, it seemed a good central starting point. I too struggled, and have struggled since in finding a definite one.

If there is no-one here that can help - you are stuffed!

By te by, when the museum gets going, I have a bolt (one of those which sat inside those ceramic insulators that held the telegraph wires that seemed to go up and down as we looked out of our carriage windows) borrowed from Helmdon GCR station

 

Andy

[Paul Denison]

Hi Andy,

Thanks for the reply, the SMJ crest does seem to be a problem to find, the original idea of the group was to design a badge a bit like the GWR, with the two crests side by side to show the Railway Heritage of Helmdon, having gone from two stations to none, however, I think this aim is likely not to occur sadly. That said, whilst were basing ourselves at the GCR station site, we value the SMJ legacy just as much as the GCR and any help the SMJ Society can give in this respect would be greatly appreciated.

As re the bolt, as you know the site is extensively overgrown and at the moment we need to have two surveys, ecological and archaeological done prior to any site clearance, once those are complete if there are no problems then it is anyone's guess just what will be found under the jungle, though we believe we have located the Down starter concrete signal post albeit in a wrecked condition probably from when it was taken down.

Paul

[Andy Thompson]

Paul

I've been many times and walked across the viaduct. Funny isn't it how they piled up everything that was the station into a heap on what was the island platform! 

There must be tonnes of stuff in the under-growth, happy hunting! Keep us up to date with your progress. The SMJ Society will help in anyway it can

Andy

[Dave Hayward]

Andy/ Paul

I just had a thought regarding the logo and did an internet search for this and I came up with the following link: -

http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/redirect/?CATID=11...

This takes you to all the original documentation for the SMJ as a Company. Just go to this link then follow down the page until you see the reference to the SMJ in blue, then follow from there. I have not had time to pursue from there but you might like to. There may be a picture of the logo here in one form or another. Probably also other really helpful info (of course you may have already looked at it.). I am not sure whether you can download all the files or will have to make a trip to Kew.

Hope this helps

Dave Hayward

[Dick Bodily]

Slightly of subject but equally relevant to Helmdon, did the Northampton & Banbury or the East and West Junction have coloured crests?

Again off track but possibly of interest... somewhere I've seen a picture of the GC being built near Helmdon Viaduct with a temporary link line to the East & West and some sort of a camp. I'll have a good look through all my GC literature to see if I can find it. There are unfortunately not too clear pictures of Helmdon taken by SWA Newton in Rolt's 'The Making of Railway' but somewhere I've seen better.

[Dick Bodily]

Found a picture of Helmdon GC campsite next to E&W line on this website follow link:-

http://thesmjr.ning.com/photo/helmdon-viaduct

[Jim Goodman]

I've just tried the links to the national archives but it appears that none of the documents have been digitised and cannot be downloaded. However, there does seem to be some interesting stuff on the SMJ that may not be in any of the books.

Back to the SMJ crest, I believe it's based on the Town Council's coat of arms (19th century one, not the present one). Being a modeller of the SMJ I've looked for the crest but the best I could come up with (in colour) is cross between the bowling club badge and a lapel badge, See attachments.

Regards,

Jim.

[Paul Denison]

Folks,

Thanks for all the replies, There's some very useful and interesting info here. :-)

Andy,

Will happily keep the group up to date on how things progress and we've now located a ballast fork, handle long since gone that was probably used in the destruction of the site. Were lucky with the Island platform being essentially intact albeit in need of repairs and removal of trees and other growth.

Once again to all of you a very big thanks for the info

Best wishes

Paul

[NIGEL]

As regards the company 'crest', this seems to have been copied from the seal die,a metal stamp that was used with a seal press machine, to stamp official company letters.

[NIGEL]

Paul, do you have a copy of the G.C.R. seal die ?

[Paul Denison]

HI Nigel, No I'm afraid we haven't

[NIGEL]

The G.C.R. seal die for comparison with the coat of arms.