The London Midland Region (LMR), which served central England, played a leading role in British railway history. This famous network linked many of the key cities and towns that were essential for British manufacturing and commerce - London, Rugby, Crewe, Chester, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham and Bristol. The LMR was always at the heart of the railway industry.
Extensively illustrated with photos, a history of the many locomotives that became part of this British Railways region. This book investigates the vast number of locomotives that came to the London Midland Region in 1948 upon the nationalization of the four largest railway companies in the UK. It is a class-by-class survey with over two hundred illustrations, covering all the top link and freight classes and also looking at the smaller types of locomotive, operating on branch lines and doing more humble tasks. The author explores what happened to them, and also looks at those that eventually made their way into preservation.
Anyone with an interest in railway history will be fascinated by this pictorial memoir. Over 150 photographs appear in the book including photographs taken at the famous Barry scrapyard where so many locomotives ended their days.
Drawn from Eric Sawford's extensive archive, this volume takes a look back at the London Midland region from the 1950s right through to the end of steam. This book is for anyone who remembers the golden age of transporting, or any modeller attempting to capture the essence of this period.
ferroequinologist (noun) Someone who studies the 'Iron Horse' (i.e. trains and locomotives). From the Latin ferrus 'iron' and equine 'horse' + -logist As the British steam era drew to a close, a young Keith Widdowson set out to travel on as many steam-hauled trains as possible – documenting each journey in his notebooks. In Confessions of a Steam Age Ferroequinologist, he cracks these books open and blows off the dust. His self-imposed mission, that of riding behind as many Iron Horses as possible prior to their premature annihilation, led to hours of nocturnal travels, extended periods of inactivity in station waiting rooms, missed connections and fatigue. However, any downsides of his quest were compensated by the camaraderie found amongst a group of like-minded colleagues who congregated on such trains. This is a book that no self-respecting ferroequinologist should be without.
In this volume, Eric Sawford uses a selection of photographs to tell the story of the last days of steam power on the Eastern Region. His pictures show that, while steam locomotives were not withdrawn from the Eastern Region until the mid 1960s, the 1950s was their swan song. The author's photographs document the range of motive power that could be seen on the track in that era. Locomotives are depicted in action and at rest, on the express routes, shunting or being repaired. Also recorded are neglected locomotives during their declining years, when they were used on secondary duties or were laid up before being scrapped.
The disappearance of the steam locomotive in the land of its birth touched the hearts of millions, but when the government announced the Modernisation Plan for Britain's railways in 1955, under which steam was to be phased out in favour of diesel and electric traction, few people took it seriously. Steam locomotives were an integral part of our daily lives and had been for almost one and a half centuries. Furthermore, they were still being built in large numbers. It was popularly believed that they would see the century out and probably well beyond that. But the reality was that by 1968 a mere thirteen years after the Modernisation Plan steam traction had disappeared from Britain's main line railways. It was harrowing to witness the breaking up of engines, which were the icons of their day, capable of working long-distance inter-city expresses weighing 400 tons on schedules faster than a mile a minute. Top speeds of 100mph were not unknown.This book chronicles the last few years as scrap yards all over Britain went into overtime, cutting up thousands of locomotives and releasing a bounty of more than a million tons of scrap whilst the engines, which remained in service, were a shadow of their former selves; filthy, wheezing and clanking their way to an ignominious end. The pictures in this book are augmented by essays written by Colin Garratt at the time. Although steam disappeared from the main line network it survives in everdwindling numbers on industrial systems such as collieries, ironstone mines, power stations, shipyards, sugar factories, paper mills and docks. In such environments steam traction eked out a further decade and during this time many of the industrial locations closed rendering the locomotives redundant. The British steam locomotive was born amid the coalfields and was destined to die there one and three quarter centuries later.
After the Second War, Britains railways were rundown and worn out, requiring massive investment and modernisation. The Big Four railway companies were nationalized from 1948, and the newly formed British Railways embarked on a programme of building new Standard steam locomotives to replace older types. These started to come on stream from 1951.
