If you register, you can do a lot more. And become an active part of our growing community. You'll have access to hidden forums, and enjoy the ability of replying and starting conversations.

Edward Thompson: Wartime C.M.E. Discussion

Discussion in 'Steam Traction' started by S.A.C. Martin, May 2, 2012.

  1. Hermod

    Hermod Member

    Joined:
    May 6, 2017
    Messages:
    985
    Likes Received:
    283
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Klitmoeller,Denmark
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    I think Thomson was more usefull and less egotripping than a couple of other CMEs.
    Some from LNER even,but after 103 pages here I am not sure yet.
    Will the book end with some kind of verdict?
     
  2. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Aug 31, 2010
    Messages:
    5,591
    Likes Received:
    9,325
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Asset Engineer (Signalling), MNLPS Treasurer
    Location:
    London
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    Yes I am an active volunteer
    It will end with a personal view from me. I think it’s important that people make up their own minds without being led.

    That is why the book includes as much of the negative criticism of Thompson as much as the positive and more constructive debate and contemporary evidence I could find.
     
    jnc likes this.
  3. huochemi

    huochemi Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    May 6, 2008
    Messages:
    2,751
    Likes Received:
    1,393
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    UK
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    Rather provocative and I am sure that will be addressed at length by SACM. As an example which I don't think has been noted (?!), Thompson modified the Gresley bogie with what Nock would call the De Glehn weight transfer arrangements, which was used also on the Peppercorn locos. This bogie uses spherical side bearers. The Gresley bogies on the A4s had the weight transfer through the central bearing and had to be modified with side plates because of roll. In this, Thompson brought the LNER in line with the other three companies. I would judge that an improvement rather than an ego trip.

    It is interesting that Thompson continued with the radial trailing axle on the Pacifics, rather than change it to the nearly universal Bissel truck, which arguably suggests that he did not change things for change' sake.
     
  4. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Aug 31, 2010
    Messages:
    5,591
    Likes Received:
    9,325
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Asset Engineer (Signalling), MNLPS Treasurer
    Location:
    London
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    Yes I am an active volunteer
    It is somewhat telling when you actually break down:

    • What he was allowed to do by war department and LNER board
    • What standard LNER components he used
    • What he did change (bogie and pony truck types)
    That he was making the most of the situation he had been left with.

    It remains an utterly ridiculous suggestion that he “sought out to destroy all that was Gresley”. That remains a pretty vindictive lie IMO. Much repeated unfortunately.
     
    Paul42 and jnc like this.
  5. Copper-capped

    Copper-capped Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Apr 19, 2017
    Messages:
    2,563
    Likes Received:
    3,316
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Stanthorpe, QLD, Australia
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    It is interesting that such a theory would imply that there is room for, (nay, demand for!), sentimentality in a private company that is by and large beholden to the bottom line of an accounts ledger.

    Also, given the time frame, it implies room for sentimentality in a country at war.

    If such is the case, then I join with Paul Hitch and click my tongue at gricers!
     
    gwralatea, jnc, Forestpines and 2 others like this.
  6. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Sep 8, 2005
    Messages:
    4,052
    Likes Received:
    4,665
    Occupation:
    Once computers, now part time writer I suppose.
    Location:
    SE England
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    The thing that makes me hesitate is that Cook believed that to be the case ("tragic desire to obliterate Gresley"), and he was surely the epitome of the informed neutral observer.
     
  7. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Aug 31, 2010
    Messages:
    5,591
    Likes Received:
    9,325
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Asset Engineer (Signalling), MNLPS Treasurer
    Location:
    London
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    Yes I am an active volunteer
    Based on what facts Jim? I’m all ears.

    Thompson continued to build V2s and O2s.

    He maintained the vast majority of the Gresley locomotive fleet.

    He rebuilt less than thirty Gresley locomotives of various classes.

    He continued to use Gresley standard components in all of his locomotive classes (restricted by wartime expediency, the LNER board and the war office).

    If there had been a mass culling of Gresley locomotives in favour of the Thompson designs, fine I could understand that.

    But there wasn’t - and there was never any indication from any document or news report contemporary to his tenure as CME that this would ever have been the case.
     
    jnc and Richard Roper like this.
  8. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Sep 8, 2005
    Messages:
    4,052
    Likes Received:
    4,665
    Occupation:
    Once computers, now part time writer I suppose.
    Location:
    SE England
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    Based on the fact that Cook said that: he doesn't elaborate.
    I imagine that LNER historians would be delighted if Cook had written more than a scant half dozen paragraphs on his time as E and NE region CME, but to the best of my knowledge he didn't.
     
  9. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Aug 31, 2010
    Messages:
    5,591
    Likes Received:
    9,325
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Asset Engineer (Signalling), MNLPS Treasurer
    Location:
    London
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    Yes I am an active volunteer
    Pretty much proving my point.

    So much of the anti Thompson side of the debate is based on “he said this” as opposed looking at what actually happened.

    In his book on Thompson and Peppercorn, Colonel Rogers describes the Thompson Pacifics as being comparable failures to the big tank engines of the G&WSR.

    Which is clearly a nonsense on a number of levels.

    Just because someone said it doesn’t make it fact. The Thompson Pacifics carried out their duties almost completely unmodified to the end of steam. Hardly abject failures.
     
    jnc likes this.
  10. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Sep 8, 2005
    Messages:
    4,052
    Likes Received:
    4,665
    Occupation:
    Once computers, now part time writer I suppose.
    Location:
    SE England
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    Aren't you in danger of the sort of dismissal too many of the anti Thompson writers are guilty of? Cook was a third party coming into the N & ER who is unlikely to have had any bias in one direction or another. Its hard to believe he would have been associated with one faction or another. Of course he wasn't there when Thompson (or Peppercorn) was so what he said must be based on what he found there and the people who worked for him. Cook tended to use very measured language and the wording seems strong for him. At the very least you have to say that there must have been a rather peculiar culture in the senior echelons of the department and some very strongly held beliefs about Thompson.

    All Cook has to say about locomotives is "Perhaps I was able to do a few useful things amongst which might be mentioned the overcoming of long-standing troubles with the Paciific inside connecting rods, the rebuilding of the pacifics generally but particularly the A3s with optical equipment..." and then goes on to talk about water treatment on the LTS.
     
  11. MellishR

    MellishR Resident of Nat Pres Friend

    Joined:
    Apr 16, 2009
    Messages:
    8,068
    Likes Received:
    5,165
    Whoever runs whatever organisation in whatever way, there will always be some people who disapprove. Thompson certainly had to make some changes from the Gresley regime and those assuredly would have upset some people, regardless of the rights and wrongs. Maybe some of those disaffected people muttered to each other over the next few years, through the Peppercorn regime and into the BR regime, gradually building up a body of anti-Thompson opinion, supported by falsehoods and half-truths. Similar fake news (about other subjects) has been much commented on in recent times. Possibly by the time Cox arrived everybody was telling everybody else that Thompson had been a bad lot, jealous of Gresley and keen to change everything. That was certainly the impression that I got when first hearing about the Thompson regime on the LNER. I am most grateful to Simon for seeking out facts to the greatest extent possible all these years later.

    Whatever the actual story of the "rebuilding" of Great Northern (from what Simon has revealed, more a case of building a brand new locomotive and just transferring the identity and a few bits of hardware) it made a great anti-Thompson story for anyone who wished to present it in that way.
     
    gwralatea and jnc like this.
  12. gwralatea

    gwralatea Member

    Joined:
    Dec 31, 2014
    Messages:
    469
    Likes Received:
    929
    Gender:
    Male
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    Having seen exactly this happen to someone's reputation over the period of a decade at a company I worked for, if I was a gambling man this is exactly where I'd be putting my money after reading the last 104 pages.

    Not suggesting for a minute that it was a co-ordinated effort, but just one of those things. By the time I left, a decent hard-working leader's reputation had been trampled through the mud by the drip drip of people who remained in influential positions and a) idolised one of his contemporary directors and b) didn't agree with some (relatively small) changes he'd made to how we did things when the idol had gone and before he too left.

    King over the water syndrome is more common in business than it should be. Good organisations will try and mitigate it, but you can't stop human nature.
     
  13. ross

    ross Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    May 18, 2017
    Messages:
    1,002
    Likes Received:
    2,477
    Gender:
    Male
    Location:
    Titfield
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    There is a very strong likelihood that this is correct. It is, as you say, human nature.

    A strong likelihood is not conclusive proof though.

    My boss at Network Rail was a proficient and apparently competent manager-he gave me some opportunities, and frankly I adored him. Others at Network Rail loathed him. I could never comprehend their bitterness. I never knew the basis of it, and as his man, no-one wanted to explain.

    Gresley had been CME for 20 years. He gave the LNER the most beautiful locomotives ever, the fastest and most stylish streamlined trains and world speed records. Whoever followed him would have, in the eyes of many, been inadequate. This “personality cult” would be ideal breeding ground for the campaign of grumbles described above. Gresley's sudden death, and people's shock and sense of loss would also have strongly contributed.

    Look at the overnight change in the public perception of princess Diana....


    There is however the possibility that men such as Cook, Nock, etc. who were there at the time did detect darker motives in Thompson. Those who met him, worked with him, might have actually detected a real malevolence in Thompson, and are actually moderating their language when they allude to him wanting to overwrite Gresley's legacy, and it is that general feeling of distaste by those who were there that has left Thompson with such a poor reputation.

    The real shame is that Simon didn't start his research in 1955 when memories were fresher.
     
    S.A.C. Martin likes this.
  14. johnofwessex

    johnofwessex Resident of Nat Pres

    Joined:
    Apr 6, 2015
    Messages:
    9,186
    Likes Received:
    7,226
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Thorn in my managers side
    Location:
    72
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    Given that he knew he only had 5 years in the job, and the conditions prevailing at the time, the idea that he could - even if he wanted to 'Trash Gresleys Legacy' seems a little far fetched.................
     
    MellishR and S.A.C. Martin like this.
  15. johnofwessex

    johnofwessex Resident of Nat Pres

    Joined:
    Apr 6, 2015
    Messages:
    9,186
    Likes Received:
    7,226
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Thorn in my managers side
    Location:
    72
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    If I were to summarise the argument though, Thompson takes over after the unexpected death of Gresley. A Charismatic and well regarded man who has been in post for over 20 years.

    Situations are difficult due to WW2 and certain elements of his predecessors which worked well in pre WW2 conditions are now causing problems.

    As a result Thompson has no option other than to strike out in different directions.

    To complicate matters Thompson has a perceived motive for holding a grudge against Gresley, I know that Robinson turned down the CME's post at The Grouping saying that Gresley should have it but does anyone know what Ravens views were?
     
    S.A.C. Martin likes this.
  16. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Aug 31, 2010
    Messages:
    5,591
    Likes Received:
    9,325
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Asset Engineer (Signalling), MNLPS Treasurer
    Location:
    London
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    Yes I am an active volunteer
    Cook not being there is precisely the issue. He has made his own judgements based not on his own experience of Thompson but the hearsay of others.

    There is absolutely no doubt Thompson rubbed some people up the wrong way over his career, together with some characteristic lacking in tact on his part, but the question of a reliable witness (or indeed at all? Particularly on Cooks part) emerges.

    JF Harrison was there, he was one of Thompson’s assistants, and he gives a mixed review but fundamentally believed that Thompson did seek to undermine Gresleys work.

    He is a first hand source, was there, experienced Thompson the man.

    He was interviewed by a few people and Peter Graftons interview of him is more measured than that written by Colonel Rogers.

    Go the other way, and Dick Hardy worked in the LNER drawing office - and actually on the rebuilt Great Northern no less! He tells a VERY different story to everyone else on GN, not only giving a different name for who “chose” GN (LA Musgrave) but also questioning the validity of the claims that there was cloak and daggers affair with new drawings going on (which makes no sense in reality because the A1 development went on for three more years and the version that emerged was nowhere near a draft stage when Thompson was CME).

    So you are right. There IS a danger of dismissing sources too readily. But I’m afraid the holes in the anti-Thompson camps arguments are there for all to see, were one to look at the whole, and search out the information that exists (for which a number of you have asked for sources and materials, and I have been happy to make them available).

    On a side note, given the question of Thompson’s reputation within the LNER, I sincerely doubt that the prototypes A2/3 would have been named after him if his superiors in the directors of the board of the LNER had not been at the very least satisfied in both the man and his work.

    It struck me as rather summing up Thompson’s attitude and work that his first all new mixed traffic Pacific was the one named after him, and not an out and out express locomotive. He had been keen to emphasise the mixed traffic requirements of the locomotive type being developed as it had gone since the A2/2 first emerged.

    However Thompson did not like naming engines generally and was apparently quite indignant when his prototype B1 came out as Springbok instead of his chosen name “Utility”.
     
    ross likes this.
  17. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Sep 8, 2005
    Messages:
    4,052
    Likes Received:
    4,665
    Occupation:
    Once computers, now part time writer I suppose.
    Location:
    SE England
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    We're at severe danger of starting again at page one.

    What little Cook had to say included nothing about the rights and wrongs of anyone's policies or engineering.

    All I am saying is that in the light of that statement from Cook I would hesitate to use phrases like ”utterly ridiculous" and ”vindictive lie". They seem far too polarised. It doesn't read like an even handed evaluation. I don't think you do your subject or yourself any favours by using them. Far better, I submit, to provide a rational study of Thompson's work and circumstances and make a good case that Thompson did not seek to obliterate Gresley, and why you believe that evaluation to be flawed.

    You need, I think, to categorise that belief, clearly widespread among people in a good position to know, as mistaken, not malevolent.

    It is, I submit, an error especially of the internet age that we are prone to thinking that the way to challenge one extreme is to fight from the opposite. And, after all, when there are two sides the truth is usually somewhere in between...
     
    Last edited: Jun 9, 2018
  18. S.A.C. Martin

    S.A.C. Martin Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Aug 31, 2010
    Messages:
    5,591
    Likes Received:
    9,325
    Gender:
    Male
    Occupation:
    Asset Engineer (Signalling), MNLPS Treasurer
    Location:
    London
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    Yes I am an active volunteer
    And that would be fine Jim, were it to be entirely “mistaken”.

    Unfortunately the evidence I’ve collated suggests a degree of malevolence.

    Particularly when coupled with previously discussed - and hugely frustrating - effective censorship.

    But that is my personal view - I am still capable of providing sources and contexts with the intention of providing a balanced debate.
     
  19. Monkey Magic

    Monkey Magic Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Jan 6, 2018
    Messages:
    3,498
    Likes Received:
    6,845
    Location:
    Here, there, everywhere
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    I don’t think the LNER was the only railway with departmental spats.

    Gresley has been CME at the GNR and then LNER since 1911. He would for many be only cme that they knew. My impression is that patronage matters in getting ahead and the price of patronage is loyalty. It would be interesting to know what percentage of senior employees were gnr vs those who came up via ger, ner, the Scottish companies etc. Is Doncaster dominated by Gresley protégées?

    To go back to how Thompson interacted with people.

    A couple of things strike me. Although Thompson is an academic rather than practical engineer, much like Fairburn but while Fairburn gets a first, Thompson gets a third. He clearly has a different trajectory to others within the engineering dept, but his academic achievements are inferior to his contemporaries on the LMS. Does that maybe make Thompson a little bit defensive when dealing with people, and a bit mistrusted by those who have come up by a different route?

    If we go back to Thompson being appointed CME, it seems to have been known to him and to others that he was the fourth choice. That would I think make anyone prickly.

    Had Gresley retired earlier with a planned succession then this would have been avoided, (maybe Bulleid would have stayed) had Gresley lived until say 1945 then it is likely that Thompson would have been bypassed in favour of a younger engineer.
     
  20. Jimc

    Jimc Part of the furniture

    Joined:
    Sep 8, 2005
    Messages:
    4,052
    Likes Received:
    4,665
    Occupation:
    Once computers, now part time writer I suppose.
    Location:
    SE England
    Heritage Railway Volunteer:
    No I do not currently volunteer
    I think, in order to make your case to as many people as possible, you need to *categorise* as mistaken. Whether bad faith and deliberate lies existed or not is perhaps better dealt with elsewhere.
     

Share This Page