Page 31 - Bulletin 8 2004

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THE AGE OF STEAM:
STEAM LOCOS AND THEIR SUCCESSORS

ON THE CAPE TOWN – SIMON’S TOWN LINE

Malcolm Bates

Introduction

At the outset I wish to pay tribute to the late Dave Rhind. His researches and hours of

digging into archival material at UCT, the Cape Archives, the newspapers, and the

Transnet Heritage Foundation have placed much valuable information into the hands of
a number of us who continue to function as the Railway History Group of Southern

Africa. This group, one can say, was truly Dave’s baby!

I wish to thank Mike Walker whose researches and historical knowledge of the False

Bay coast have provided some excellent photographic scenes. A number of these were
found in the collection of the late Malcolm Cobern of Fish Hoek. They form a

wonderful back-up to this talk about our unique suburban railway.

Lastly, I must pay tribute to my grandfather, Billy Bates, who, as a driver on the SAR

had much experience of steam on this very line and the rare opportunity (in those days)
of converting to electric traction in 1928. I will always be thankful for his journals and

anecdotes and, above all, his love of locomotives.

Evolution of the Steam Locomotive

George and Robert Stephenson’s “Rocket” is often loosely referred to as the first steam

locomotive. This mistaken reference is no doubt attributable to its immense success at
the Rainhill Trials between Liverpool and Manchester in 1829, in which “Rocket”

certainly outshone any steam motive power that had gone before. However, there is
evidence that a steam locomotive was already hauling goods traffic near Leeds in 1812.

(Fig. 2.1).