The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) produced several classes of locomotive, mostly to the designs of Nigel Gresley, characterised by a three-cylinder layout with a parallel boiler and round-topped firebox. It produced the most famous locomotive of its day, 4468 'Mallard', the holder of the world steam locomotive speed record. It also built the world-famous 4472 'Flying Scotsman'. However, its locomotive inheritance was much greater than just the 'A4 Class', it also produced highly successful mixed-traffic and freight designs.

Locomotives of constituent companies

Great Central Railway

Including the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway

Richard Peacock (1846–1854)

W. G. Craig (1854–1859)

Charles Sacré (1859–1886)

Thomas Parker (1886–1893)

Harry Pollitt (1893–1900)

John G. Robinson (1900–22)

see John G. Robinson There were also 3 steam rail cars built in 1904–1905. These were withdrawn in 1914.

Lancashire, Derbyshire and East Coast Railway

The Lancashire, Derbyshire and East Coast Railway was absorbed by the Great Central Railway on 1 January 1907. All LD&ECR locomotives were built by Kitson & Co.

Great Eastern Railway

Great North of Scotland Railway

In 1923 the Great North of Scotland Railway passed on a total of 122 locomotives, 100 4-4-0 tender locomotives and 22 tank engines, all capable of being used on either passenger or goods trains, to the LNER.

Great Northern Railway

Hull and Barnsley Railway

From its formal establishment in 1885 to the time that it was taken over by the North Eastern Railway (NER) in 1922, the CME of the H&BR was Matthew Stirling, who, like his father and uncle, built locomotives with domeless boilers.

Metropolitan Railway

Three classes (the G, H and K Classes) were taken into LNER stock on 1 November 1937. The other former Metropolitan locomotives were retained by London Transport, which had acquired all of them at its formation on 1 July 1933.

Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway

M&GN locomotives were taken into LNER stock on 1 October 1936.

North British Railway

North Eastern Railway

Locomotives built by the LNER

Gresley designs

Thompson designs

Peppercorn designs

Another A1, "Tornado" has been built by subscription among LNER (and other) locomotive enthusiasts, and came into service in 2008. In total it cost £3 million. Again under the chairmanship of Mark Allatt, the team is (2014) now raising funds most successfully to build another Gresley P2 2-8-2 of the "Cock O'the North" Class, to be called "Prince of Wales". Both new steam locomotives are the product of a restored railway works in Darlington.

Other designs

Post-Nationalisation

British Railways continued to build LNER designs (the B1 and L1 classes in particular) immediately after Nationalisation. Remarkably, it even built a new series of shunting locomotives (J72 class) to a pre-Grouping design (of the North Eastern Railway). However, it was to be the Eastern Region that took the first of BR's new Standard locomotives, 70000 'Britannia', for its Great Eastern Main Line workings to Norwich in 1951. BR built 396 locomotives to ex-LNER designs. One of these, the J72 Class was a North Eastern Railway design dating from 1898.

Withdrawal

Withdrawal of ex-LNER locomotives took place throughout the 1960s, with some of the once high-profile 'A4 Class' locomotives ending their lives on heavy freight trains in Scotland; a far cry from the glamorous express workings of the late 1930s.

Preservation

Several of the many LNER locomotives have been preserved. (Numbers given are those currently carried: many locomotives have carried a range of numbers during their active and preserved careers). † denotes name given only in preservation.

Footnotes

Sources