OUR current 'cold snap' is already being compared to similar periods in earlier years.

According to one commentator, we have to look back to 1981 for something similar.

Unfortunately, I can remember a lot further back than that, to the winters of 1962/63, and 'second hand' to the early months of 1947, when heavy snowfall blanketed the country, and trains were being dug out of the snowdrifts by hand.

I say 'second hand', because in those early post-war years I was in HM Forces, and located right at the end of the Middle East supply lines, at a place which has become much better known in recent years than it was then — Basra in Iraq.

In those days Iraq was a kingdom, under British protection, and happily a very peaceful and most sunny place. In fact, far too hot in the summer.

But I heard all about the privations of that winter in letters from home, which were then our only means of communication while away. Air mail took three days and surface mail a minimum of three weeks.

Most homes back in 1947 were heated by coal-fired open grates, and people had to contend with shortages of coal, itself often of dubious quality, which became frozen solid in the wagons in which it was being delivered.

Power cuts were not unknown, because the coal-fired power stations also ran out of coal. And everyone had to exist on rations which were in some cases less generous than they had been during the war.

I lost both my maternal grandparents to the effects of the winter of 1946/47, though both were well into their 80s, a good age for those times.

But 1962/63 may well turn out to be the model for this winter, and I don't want to worry you folks, but that cold spell started with snowfall after Christmas, down here mainly on December 28/29, and in shady spots along Shiphay Lane, rutted ice in the road from that snowfall was still visible at the end of February. Anywhere the sun could not get at it, the snow remained.

I remember that first Saturday December 28, 1962, very well, because it was to be the 'Last Day' for passenger services between Plymouth and Launceston, over the old GWR branch line. Fortunately, as it turned out, I had a meeting to attend in Exeter that evening, and so opted for the morning service out to Launceston and back.

It was snowing blizzard snow all that day, and Lydford station on the very edge of Dartmoor, looked and felt like the South Pole.

Later that day, the last two scheduled trains never started out, and the two previous departures both got stranded — one at Bickleigh and one at Tavistock.

Meanwhile, I caught the 4pm Southern service to Exeter Central, hauled by Battle of Britain class 4-6-2 No.34063 229 Squadron, anticipating an 'interesting' journey.

Despite the falling snow which was rapidly obliterating the down track, we pressed on as far as Bridestowe, where we were held for an hour, with the blizzard raging outside, while the points at Meldon Junction were cleared of snow.

We were eventually hand-signalled through the junction and into Okehampton at 6.05pm, and thence down to Exeter without further incident.

I eventually arrived home from Exeter at 1.55am.