It must have been hard to justify using these units during the war with the shortage of oil, especially as most of it had to be imported. I had a quick look to see if I could find an article about that accident in 1950, but can't find anything yet. But there are several articles reporting that the LMS had ordered these three to be built by Leyland motors, May 1933.
I see now why these wouldn't appear in a WTT, but as you mentioned in a different thread, they'd be in some sort of weekly / special notice. Much safer in fact to use on a branch line late one Saturday night / very early Sunday morning after all other traffic has stopped and several hours at least before it begins again.
I presume there would have been a guard on board? who perhaps sat in the spare drivers seat at the other end during journeys?
Regarding the Spring Vale-Blackburn-Clitheroe trips, do we know if these too were late night journeys, or perhaps during a Sunday when this line would have been quieter?
No, the initial runs during their first few months would have been on special notices, but after they settled down to regular work their trains between Spring Vale and Clitheroe would have been in the timetable like any other regular service, although possible marked as worked by railcars. The Spring Vale-Blackburn-Clitheroe service was a normal passenger one and seems to have been operated by them from mid-1934, fully from April 1935, to 1941; I don’t know if they worked the full service or shared it with steam workings, but they presumably had taken it over from steam (unless it was a newly introduced service).
To make clear: Spring Vale-Clitheroe was a normal passenger throughout the day, just like hundreds of others throughout the country. It just happened to be railcar worked and was their main job when at Lower Darwen.
I do not know what the arrangements for the trains to Accrington and Padiham were, but as they got as far as being mentioned in the special instructions for the railcars, I would suspect that they had at least paths in the WTT which could be activated either in advance by notice or on the day by Control instructions. A
pure guess is that they would be for passengers from Manchester or Preston whose (last) train had arrived late at Blackburn and missed the connection; this would avoid holding the connection back for a small number of passengers. But I do not know without evidence.
I am pretty well certain that they had a guard on board as he is mentioned in the special instructions and single-manning was virtually unknown. There might have been a tip-up seat, but he would probably have to be prepared to stand.
Just to make a point clear: the railcars were only used on trials between delivery around February and June 1934, after which they were based at Lower Darwen for, primarily, the Spring Vale-Clitheroe service. It looks as thought to be the railcars started working this in summer 1934, but the full service started in April 1935. The Accrington and Padiham trains were also part of their normal duties, but probably only operated on an As Required basis. There was no practice of only using them at quiet times because of the operating restrictions due to their light weight and reduced crash-worthiness: they could be used at any time, just with certain adjustments.
