It should have been a 2000!

I shall never forget the time I was firing for Joe Holden. We were booking on around 3:30 am. Anyway, he said to me this one day, "Are you coming up the club tonight?". I said, "But what about the trip tomorrow, the express to Euston and back again?"

"Don't worry", said Joe, "we have a 2000 each way". So I joined him up the Railwaymen's Club that evening and had 'a few'. Needless to say, after leaving the club when they threw us out, I headed off back home to Kilsby to get changed, and I think I had an hour in the chair.

I wasn't exactly the picture of vitality when I booked on, but Joe reminded me that it would be a 2000 each way. We walked over to the station and Joe got on the phone to Control. "It's 45 minutes late!", he said, "what's it got on it?" Lordy, Lordy! It had a Lizzie, and didn't I know it by the time we got to Euston!

Anyway, we took the engine to Camden and we went to look on the board to see what we had to take back. Yep! You guessed it, another Lizzie!

Joe Holden virtually fired and drove it all the way back! What a gentleman! I certainly never went drinking again when I was on early mornings!

Jack (Big) Pratt