Actor Edward Fox rededicates locomotive (From Thisisdorset)

Actor Edward Fox rededicates locomotive

3:20pm Saturday 19th September 2009 in

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ACTOR Edward Fox was today rededicating a locomotive named after a Battle of Britain airfield.

He was performing the honours on the steam locomotive Manston at Swanage station.

Purbeck resident Mr Fox, who starred as Pilot Officer Archie in the 1969 Battle of Britain film, was unveiling the newly-restored Battle of Britain class Bulleid Pacific No 34070.

Guests from the Royal Air Force and Royal Australian Air Force, and relatives of Second World War airmen were at the ceremony.

After the ceremony, Manston was making two return trips from Swanage to Harman’s Cross, Corfe Castle and Norden.

After being rescued from a South Wales scrapyard during the late 1970s, the volunteer-run Southern Locomotives Limited spent five years and £750,000 on returning Manston to full working order in its original 1947 air-smoothed boiler casing.

The locomotive now hauls trains on the re-laid Purbeck Line.