Press Office
Auction of rail memorabilia nets £60,000for NRM's Queen Victoria's carriage restoration fund
The NRM has staged an auction of railway artifacts and memorabilia with the aim of saving one of the world's most important railway treasures - Queen Victoria's last surviving royal carriage. One hundred and one years after her death, Britain's longest reigning monarch would probably be less than amused by the saloon's present condition! The bid to preserve this national icon of the 20th century and the estimated £100,000 it will cost to save it began in earnest just over a year ago.
On Sunday, 13 October 2002 this major project benefited from the sale of some of the most sought-after locomotive nameplates that have never before been up for public auction. The centrepiece of the auction, provided by English Welsh & Scottish Railway (EWS), was an extremely rare collection of locomotive nameplates, including Isambard Kingdom Brunel, County of Mid Glamorgan, Thomas Telford, Tre Pol and Pen, David Lloyd George, Fort William An Gearasden, and Helvellyn.
A total of £73,589 was raised from the auction and the NRM has now sufficient funds to complete the restoration of Queen Victoria's carriage. The hammer prices of the principle items are given below.
£10,400
£6,100
£5,100
£5,100
£5,100
£4,600
£4,000
"Helping to raise funds to conserve a national icon is such a worthwhile opportunity. Ensuring the future of the carriage will ultimately give pleasure to thousands of visitors to the NRM"
said Sue Evans, EWS Head of Corporate Communications.
"We hope the donation of these particular nameplates will generate some very competitive bidding and in turn raise a substantial amount of money to go towards the project."
Also heading the auction billing is a range of contemporary nameplates donated by Porterbrook Leasing Company Limited. Rupert Brennan-Brown, Head of Corporate Communications for Porterbrook, said:
"We are delighted to be able to support our friends at the National Railway Museum. Nameplates are highly collectable artefacts and we're hoping that Thomas Telford, Chartered Inst of Transport and Xlll Commonwealth Game Scotland 1986 will create a buzz in the auction room too."
The magnificent array of objects up for auction did not stop at nameplates. Among items that went under the auctioneer's hammer were swallows and depot plaques, sporting silverware from LNER and BR, oak-cased mantle clocks, posters (including much sought after examples by Terence Cuneo) and even a Hallade track-recording instrument! The auction, which was conducted free of charge by specialists from Sheffield Railwayana Auctions, produced some surprise and unusual items that attracted fierce bidding from collectors.
"Railway memorabilia has always been very popular to collect and I am sure there are many people who have items in their attics who possibly do not know what to do with them," said Ian Wright, Sheffield Railwayana Auctions. "We're offering to auction any unwanted objects brought in by members of the public, the proceeds of which will go towards the conservation fund."
Richard Gibbon, NRM Curator of Collections, added: "
The Museum will also be fueling the bidding frenzy and auctioning off driver training on Rocket, a freight shunting challenge, a personal behind the scenes guided tour of the Museum, and two tickets to the NRM Annual Dinner, the rail industry's social event of the year."
The auction was a joint initiative between the NRM and Sheffield Railwayana Auctions, in partnership with EWS and supported by Porterbrook Leasing Company Limited.
Jon Ingham, Head of Fundraising at the Museum, said:
"we raised an amazing amount of money and we expect to clear around £60,000. There were about 300 people at the auction, which was a great turnout" Any money raised in excess of the £1000,000 required will be used to provide additional educational at the Museum for the local schoolchildren.
14 October, 2002