GWR 7800 Class 7821 Ditcheat Manor

Ditcheat Manor
7821 Ditcheat Manor on display at the Swindon Steam Museum.
Type and origin Power type Steam Build date November 1950
Specifications Gauge 1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in) standard gauge
Career Operators Western Region Class 7800 'Manor' Class Numbers 7821 Retired 1965

Great Western Railway 7800 Class No. 7821 Ditcheat Manor is a preserved British steam locomotive.

The second of the last batch of 10 engines of the thirty-strong class, 7821 was actually built by British Railways in 1950. Like most of the class of lightweight 4-6-0s, it was allocated to lines in Mid Wales, but was also based Oxley and Newton Abbott. 7821 was withdrawn in November 1965 and was sent to Woodham Brothers scrapyard in Barry, Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales.

Rescued from Barry in 1980, it was sent to the embryonic Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway, before moving to the Llangollen Railway and then Swindon, restoration being completed in 1998, when it first steamed at the West Somerset Railway. The loco then worked on the Great Central Railway in Leicestershire, but in late 2005 moved to the Cambrian Railways Trust. 7821 moved again in 2005 to the Churnet Valley Railway where it served its last months of its boiler ticket in traffic.

After being sold to the West Somerset Railway Association in 2007, 7821 was first moved to Williton railway station, and then in 2010 to Bishops Lydeard railway station whilst funding is raised for its overhaul. On 14 November 2010 the loco was moved by road to the Museum of the Great Western Railway at Swindon, for static display for five years. In November 2015 No. 7821 returned from Swindon to the West Somerset Railway Association in advance of a future overhaul.

Allocations

First shed November 1950	March 1959	May 1965	Last Shed
Oswestry	Tyseley	Wolverhampton Oxley	Shrewsbury

External links

• West Somerset Railway Association
• West Somerset Railway (unofficial fan page)
• Great Central Railway: 7821
• Preserved locomotive database