Locomotives of the London and North Western Railway

Locomotives of the London and North Western Railway. The LNWR was headquartered at Crewe.

Locomotives inherited from constituent companies

The LNWR was formed in 1846 with the merger of the Grand Junction Railway, the London and Birmingham Railway and the Manchester and Birmingham Railway.

The GJR and the L&BR initially had their workshops at Edge Hill but the latter quickly moved to Wolverton. The Grand Junction built a new works at Crewe in 1843, while the Manchester and Birmingham's works was at Longsight.

While the GJR and M&BR locos were mainly by Robert Stephenson, the L&B's were "Bury" types - indeed Edward Bury was its locomotive superintendent. Because of unreliability of the inside cylinder engine's crank axles, the M&BR, under John Ramsbottom, modified and redesigned several of them, including the use of outside cylinders. These, after amalgamation, became known as the "Old Crewe" types. Crewe and Wolverton became headquarters of the northern and southern divisions respectively, and there were distinct differences in their design strategies.

In 1922 the LNWR merged with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway and the North London Railway to form a larger company still called the LNWR.

See:
* Locomotives of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway
* locomotives of the North London Railway

Locomotives under the LNWR

The first engineer at Crewe works was Francis Trevithick, son of Richard Trevithick who continued to build the basic 2-2-2 and 2-4-0 designs. Alexander Allan was Works Manager at Crewe from 1843 to 1853.

* 4-2-2 Cornwall (1847)

In 1857, Longsight was merged with Crewe, from where wagon building had been transferred to Earlestown in 1855. Trevithick returned to Cornwall with an honorarium, and Ramsbottom became Northern Division Superintendent. He began to standardise and modernise the locomotive stock, initially replacing the 2-4-0 goods engines with his "DX" 0-6-0.

The Southern division at Wolverton continued building engines until 1862 when production was concentrated at Crewe. The Locomotive Superintendent was James McConnell who had previously worked for the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway at their Bromsgrove works. Among his designs were the 2-2-2 "Bloomers". The Southern Division being remote from sources of coke and coal, its trains were necessarily longer and heavier, and he had introduced 0-6-0 locos as early as 1847.

= John Ramsbottom (1857-1871) =

Charles Bowen-Cooke (1909-1920)

With a reasonably comprehensive fleet, Bowen-Cooke arranged exchanges with other railways in 1909 and 1910 to assess the scope for improvements, among which was superheating.

H. P. M. Beames (1920-1922)

= George Hughes (1922) =

In 1922 the LNWR merged with the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (L&YR) to form a larger company still called the LNWR. George Hughes, formerly CME of the L&YR became CME of the LNWR. A year later the large company was grouped into the LMS and Hughes became CME of the LMS.

Locomotives of the North London Railway

In the early days, locomotives were bought from outside builders but, from 1863, they were built in the North London Railway's workshops at Bow, London.

= William Adams (1854-1873) =

* 4-4-0T (16" inside cylinders) built 1863-1865
* 4-4-0T (17" inside cylinders) built 1865-1869
* 4-4-0T (17" outside cylinders) built 1868-1876
* 4-4-0T (17½" outside cylinders) built 1876-?

John C. Park (1873-1893)

* 0-6-0T (17" outside cylinders) built 1879-?

Henry J. Pryce (1893-1908)

Influence on LMS policy

Crewe's influence on the locomotives of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway was less than that of its great rival the Midland. However, the LMS did produce an unsuccessful Midlandised version of the G class 0-8-0s, see LMS Class 7F 0-8-0.

Preservation

Several have survived including
* "Hardwicke" LNWR Improved Precedent Class (Jumbo) 2-4-0 (1887)
* Webb 0-6-2T Coal Tank
* and some others.

References

* Baxter, B., (1978-9) "British Locomotive Catalogue 1825-1923 Vols.2A & 2B", Moorland Publishing
* Reed, M.C., (1996) "The London & North Western Railway", Atlantic Transport Publishers
* Edward Talbot (1985) "An Illustrated History of LNWR Engines", OPC.
* W.B. Yeadon A Compendium of LNWR Locomotives 1912-1949
** Vol 1 Passenger Tender Engines
** Vol 2. Goods Tender Engines

External links

* [http://www.lnwrs.org.uk/Glossary/index.php LNWR society glossary with a list of classes]