SR Box van No. 49883 was built by the Southern Railway (SR) in Ashford Works in the second half of 1940. This wagon was built as part of an order of 400 of the diagram 1458 wagons which were required to help the war effort. This batch of wagons was built between May 1940 and the end of December 1940. This was not the first batch of diagram 1458 box vans, which had started being produced in 1935 after the standard SR box van design was changed to create a standard 10ft long wheelbase across all freight companies as per the Railway Clearing House decision earlier that year. All Diagram 1458 box vans were built fitted with vacuum braking equipment, with the only real differences between batched being the use of consistent planking widths, or a “2+2” planking arrangement, which ours carries.

At least 67 of the A1034 batch of wagons went to the War Department as either new or nearly new wagons. These wagons were generally used either as part of the SR manufactured mobile workshop trains or as mobile generator vans – both of which had examples shipped over to France and other countries to assist with the war effort out on the front lines. It’s not known exactly what our wagon was used for initially, but it was spent the majority of it’s life in War Department/Ministry of Defence use. It is believed that during this time, the vacuum braking equipment was removed as part of the conversion for a mobile workshop, and the vehicle was eventually numbered “ARMY 42018” which ended up in use at the Long Marston MoD Depot.

In the early 90’s, the MoD rail system at P&EE Shoeburyness was closed which allowed the MoD to transfer its vacuum fitted internal user vehicles (that were in good condition) over to Long Marston to allow the withdrawal of the unfitted vehicles such as ARMY 42018. Subsequently the vehicle was advertised for sale by tender, which is when the railway acquired it. At that time, the railway owned a number of box vans which were in poor condition and as such a deal was struck to exchange these mostly rotten vehicles on a one to one basis for the much better conditioned vehicles being sold by Long Marston. This is also how we acquired the 2 AVRHT owned Vanwide box vans as they came across in this exchange. Thanks to a railway volunteer who worked at Long Marston, the wagon was shot blasted at the site and then primed in a red oxide paint before it was transferred to Bitton. During this process the vehicles wagon plates were removed, and it turned up on site with no means of identification as to it’s number.

Once at Bitton, the wagon was converted into being a mess/riding van wagon for the Permanent way team to use. This involved painting the wagon in a less vibrant livery, plain black, and also fitting a vacuum through pipe to allow its use in partially fitted freight trains. During the early 2010’s, the vehicle was sign written by a volunteer to improve the vehicles appearance. As no number was known for the vehicle at that time, the wagon team created a fictional number based upon a photo in a book which contained a wagon of the same type being used on the Mangotsfield to Bath Branch. This is where the wagon became known as DS56971. Since then, the wagon has continued to be used as a store, but has sadly lost its sign writing due to several graffiti attack requiring quick repainting of the black.

In 2024, a railway volunteer undertook some research on the vehicle at the railway and stumbled across photos of a similar looking wagon, shown to be at Long Marston, on a well-known wagon photo album site. Alongside a “spot the difference” process between photos of the wagon and also a literature review using several Southern Railway wagon books, it was agreed by a group of volunteers that we’re mostly confident that the wagon identity was in fact 49883, and as such the plan is to reinstate this identity to the wagon.