In December 1923 the Victorian Railways (VR) acquired control of the Deniliquin & Moama Railway Company. The D&MR had been running since the 1870's.
Amongst the stock were fixed wheel open wagons similar in design to 'standard' 10 ton capacity _I__ wagons which the VR had been building through the 1880's. The wagons were classed ID, numbers 31, 33 - 50.
Wagons 46 - 50 were most interesting. They were built as ID 46 - 50 at Newport Workshops in 1922 for the D&MR. They were standard pattern "I" wagons as built at that period.
In 1923 when the railways took over the D&M, the five wagons were re-numbered into the I wagon group to replace wagons damaged in derailments. One of these duplicate wagons survived to the late 1970's as a Workshops transfer vehicle.
The construction of the five wagons in 1922 sheds some light on a long standing mystery: the introduction of the suffix "D" for D&MR stock. Up to the 1900's, the D&MR stock was uncoded. Wagons were placed in service with the entire freight fleet in one number group. Yet by 1922 the vehicles of the D&MR were coded the VR freight code letter for the type plus a suffix "D" to denote D&MR. Prior to this information, it was always assumed by the writer that the codes were applied upon acquisition.
ID 46 became I 8053, scrapped 1957
ID 47 became I 8820, scrapped 1970
ID 48 became I 10653, into departmental traffic 1962, off Register 1978
ID 59 became I 8589
ID 50 became I 13651, scrapped 1976
These wagons were used to replace vehicles damaged in accidents.