Nightmare is over after millionaire buys engine

A multi-millionaire has ended a three-year nightmare for a West Midlands-born accountant and hundreds of other railway enthusiasts in an astonishing row over a locomotive.

Investment manager Jeremy Hosking is set to buy the steam engine in a deal that will pay off a bill of almost £350,000 run up by the rail buffs in a court case brought by their former chairman who lives in Birmingham.

Steve Underhill sued Tom Watson and Richard Corser for libel over a story in their quarterly newsletter 'Kings Messenger' in autumn 2007.

All three had been members of the 6024 Preservation Society, set up to save the 70-year-old loco King Edward l.

The story talked about work carried out on the engine at the Locomotive Works in Tyseley, Birmingham.

Mr Watson, who wrote the piece, claimed the comments enjoyed qualified privilege because they were only published for its 400 members but the claim was rejected because the offending magazine was also sent to 13 steam engine photographers who were ruled to be customers, not members of the Preservation Society.

Mr Corser, its treasurer, who was brought up in Halesowen, successfully argued that he was not responsible for either the writing of the article or its publication and was completely exonerated.

Mr Watson, from London, was ordered to pay £7,500 damages to Mr Underhill and the £335,000 costs of last year's case but the Society picked up the bill after agreeing to indemnify both him and Mr Corser during the action.

Mr Corser, 39, whose retired solicitor father and mother still live in Halesowen, said today: "All I wanted to do was help to preserve and run a wonderful old steam engine. We were all volunteers but it descended into a nightmare in which I risked losing everything and the Society faced being wound up.

"It was very worrying for all of us but was especially bad for my wife Sarah and myself to have this horrible litigation hanging over us and the other defendant in the case for three years. It was very stressful and used up an enormous amount of my time."

By lucky coincidence accountant Mr Corser was applying for the full-time paid post of general manager of 10 renovated steam engines bought by rail enthusiast Mr Hosking, a 52-year-old businessman with an estimated £180 million fortune.

He got the job and Mr Hosking agreed that his Royal Scot Locomotive and General Trust, that has just been granted charitable status, would buy the King Edward l for an undisclosed sum.

The deal, due to be signed within days, covers the costs and damages owed by the Society along with the price of an overhaul for the steam engine and a promise the members of the Society can run and maintain it on behalf of the Trust."

Mr Corser, now living in Winchester, declared today: "It is a win win situation that takes a huge weight off the minds of us all."