This charming early English-style station below was produced for the export market by German toy manufacturer Märklin.
The ref 2846 hand-finished Gauge 1 (or smaller) station, of soldered construction, sold for £4000 when offered in the latest of the huge Trains Galore sales at Special Auction Services (20% buyer’s premium) of Newbury. Estimated at £1500-1800, it had been consigned by one collector and bought by another.
SAS specialist Hugo Marsh said: “British-market Märklin stations are very rare, but this one had had quite a lot of retouching in places, hence we marked the price down, so we are very pleased with the result. Last one I remember selling was a bigger Churchbury station at Christie’s South Kensington in 1998 for £7500.”
Another early railway toy that performed well was a Carette for Bassett-Lowke 0 Gauge live-steam South-Eastern & Chatham Railway (SECR) steam railmotor, made c.1907-9, incorporating a small spirit-fired locomotive unit. The real-life unwieldy looking loco and carriage combinations must have seemed a great idea at the time but proved largely unpopular, being slow, riding along with a sway and featuring only one class of seat. The SECR versions made by Kitson in Leeds lasted from 1906-20 but had begun to be moved to storage in 1914.
The model version at SAS was more in demand, selling for £4800 against an estimate of £700-1000.