Stan Crouch & Stan Colbert

[Mickey]

Stan Crouch and Stan Colbert were both relief signalmen and both were aged in there early 60s during the early 1970s. I think Stan Colbert worked boxes such as Potters Bar panel, possibly Marshmoor and Hatfield No.1 and Hatfield No.2 and possibly Hatfield No.3 before it closed in late 1969(?) although I don't believe Stan Colbert ever signed WGC box because during the nearly two years that I was at the box as a 'box lad' I never saw him work the box during that time. With regards to Stan Crouch he was just a name to me although he did visit WGC box on a couple of occasions when I was at the box to talk with the signalman on duty and like Stan Colbert the two of them had probably been on the railways since the 1950s and possibly before the 1950s?. I knew of them both of sorts although I never really spoke with them as such although I may have spoken with Stan Colbert briefly when he visited WGC box to talk with Cecil White one of the WGC resident signalmen at that time. As for Stan Crouch even though he was a relief signalman I believe that he had spent the most of 1972 through 1973 and into the new year of 1974 working as a 'temporary crossing attendant' on the Up slow line on the approach to Hatfield station where I believe a temporary crossing was laid in across the Up slow line where the bridge that crosses the mainline north of Hatfield where the railway curves towards Welwyn Garden City was being rebuilt and raised in readiness for a couple of years later when the overhead wires were erected. About the time that I left WGC box in March 1974 I believe Stan's temporary crossing job finished around the same time and Stan was informed that he had to go back to signalling again.

Stan Colbert appeared to be a local LDC man (Local Departmental Committee) and on several occasions when I was a box lad at WGC Stan showed up at the box usually to talk with Cecil White one of the resident signalmen at the box who at the time was also an LDC man. The main feature about Stan was that he was as 'bald as a snooker ball' and wore glasses but he seemed friendly enough. Stan Colbert receives a namecheck in the official report into a high-speed derailment in early 1966 when a diesel hauled (Brush type 2 loco) on a Kings Cross to Cambridge semi-fast was derailed going through Hatfield station on the Down fast line due I believe to a P.Way fault near to Hatfield No.1 s/box. Stan was working in Hatfield No.1 at the time of the derailment.

I presume both of these gentlemen have long since departed this life...