Ted Bosnall

[Mickey]

Not to sure what Ted's job title actually was?. He may have been a Operations Manager or a Signalling Manager although I think he may have been under both Johnny May and Teddy Nye who were both Signalling Inspectors around the Kings Cross area and down the main line as far as possibly Hitchin?.

I would hazard a guess and say Ted was a man of about 61 or 62 years of age around 1972-73 and had possibly originated from somewhere further north of Peterborough but he was a friendly sort all the same and quite often when visiting Welwyn Garden City box he would walk along the Down platform towards the box in full view of the signalman and then he would climb the outside box staircase and once he reached top and was standing outside the closed box door he would then quite often just turn around and stand looking at the panoramic view of the station for a couple of minutes which would if the signalman had missed seeing him approaching the box gave the signalman time to 'bang in' 1-2-1-2 on the block bells to both Welwyn North and Hatfield No.2 so both signalmen at those two boxes either side of Welwyn Garden City would know Welwyn 'had company' a management visitor and to start working 'straight' on the block bells by using the 'Call Attention' before offering on trains or giving train out of section on the block bells. I dare say he would have done a similar thing when visiting other boxes along the line.

Ted possibly retired a year or two before the last few remaining boxes on his area at New Barnet, Welwyn Garden City & Langley Junction finally closed in 1976.

[StevieG]

Ted was one of the five Grade 'E' shift supervisors in KX new box when I moved into there in July 1979 Mickey, though not for long after that - might've been less than a year. Strangely I don't recall his leaving or when it was : Dave Burnett, who was one of the Grade 'D' Assistants there, got his vacancy.

Maybe I was on leave at the time; else perhaps Ted was one of those who just wanted to go 'quietly - no fuss'.

[Mickey]

Maybe he wasn't as old as I thought he was Stevie because I took him to be in his early 60s in 1972-73 and to a 15-16 year old teenager meaning ME he looked like an old bloke but everyone did to me at that age ha ha ha... So Stevie maybe he may have been around 55 or 56 years old when I saw him?. He would occasionally do a box visit at Welwyn Garden City and stay in the box for a short while chatting to whoever was the signalman and then he would leave.

Yeah I would say from what I remember of Ted through observing him in Welwyn box (I rarely spoke to people like managers back then at my age as a teenager) I could imagine him just retiring quietly and going with no fuss.

[Mickey]

Ted was one of the five Grade 'E' shift supervisors in KX new box when I moved into there in July 1979 Mickey, though not for long after that - might've been less than a year. Strangely I don't recall his leaving or when it was : Dave Burnett, who was one of the Grade 'D' Assistants there, got his vacancy.

With regards to Dave Burnett I remember being on a train chatting with him from Kings Cross one late afternoon I think it was during the summer of 1974 and I believe I told him that I was at one stage going to go to Finsbury Park No.6 as a telegraph lad because the telegraph lad's position at Welwyn Garden City had recently been abolished (the lad's job at Welwyn was abolished around March/April of 1974) and I had it in writing that I had got the vacant position at Finsbury Park No.6 but decided to transfer into the loco at Kings Cross as a secondman instead and Dave said if I had gone to Finsbury Park No.6 for a while when that box eventually closed around 1975-76 I would have gone into Kings Cross PSB (the 1971 PSB that has recently closed) and done a train recorders job at Kings Cross until I went through the signalling school and became a signalman.

It did ultimately happen but not in the way Dave was talking about it.

[Mickey]

At Welwyn Garden City box Before the introduction of multi-aspect colour light signalling and the NX panel being commissioned in September of 1973 all passenger trains on the Down lines that were stopping at WGC station and were then continuing northwards beyond WGC were ALL 'turned out' from the Down slow to the Down fast line outside the box for the run towards Welwyn North which was (obviously) worked under Absolute block regulations with the other Down line running parallel to the Down fast line being the Down goods line that was worked under permissive block regulations and went as far as Digswell brefore converging into the Down fast line for the run across the Welwyn viaduct which was controlled by Welwyn North box. In the train register book at Welwyn all trains that came along the Down fast line from Hatfield and were stopping at WGC and then continued northwards along the Down fast line towards Welwyn North were written in the train register as FSF meaning Fast/Slow/Fast.

One day Ted who was a gentle soul showed up at the box at WGC and had a friendly chat with the signalman on duty and then he got around to asking about a particular train from about a week earlier that from vague memory of 50 years ago was possibly a 'Cambridge buffet' which would have been a class 31 hauling a rake of B.R.Mk1s anyway someone from Kings Cross that had rode on that particular train had claimed that the train on departing WGC was routed along the Down goods line from WGC towards Digswell so Ted had been sent down from Kings Cross to find out if it was true?. The signalman and myself didn't know anything about that claim and when Ted looked in the train register book for that particular train it was shown as FSF. I think Ted felt a bit embarred having to chase this claim up but if he was told to look into it he had to.