NS 5000 (1946)

The NS 5000 was a series of steam locomotives of the Dutch Railways, taken over from the British War Department. The 2-10-0 locomotives were built between 1943 and 1945 by the North British Locomotive Company in Glasgow for the War Department to carry goods for the British Army during the war against Nazi Germany in mainland Western Europe, and their low axle load of 13.7 tons made them very suitable for running on makeshift or repaired railway lines. After the German surrender in May 1945 the class was used in place of Dutch engines destroyed or damaged during the war. At the beginning of 1946 the railway decided to hire about sixty as NS 5001 to 5060 for pulling freight trains, and a further 43 were added later, creating the series 5001 to 5103. The railway soon lowered the steam pressure from 15.8 to 12 kilograms per square centimetre and made the chimneys longer to clear the smoke from the driver's view. The locomotives were withdrawn between 1948 and 1952. The thousandth British built locomotive shipped to continental Europe, named Longmoor, is preserved in the Dutch Railway Museum in Utrecht and has been brought back to War Department condition as WD 73755.