The GJR and the Liverpool and Manchester Railway (LMR) initially had their workshops at Edge Hill. The London and Birmingham workshops were at Wolverton. The Grand Junction built a new works at Crewe Works which opened in 1843, while the Manchester and Birmingham's works was at Longsight.
While the GJR and M&BR locos were mainly by Robert Stephenson and Sharp Brothers, the L&B's were mostly "Bury" types – indeed Edward Bury was its locomotive superintendent. On the GJR, breakages of the inside-cylinder engines' crank axles led to the redesign of several with outside cylinders under locomotive superintendent Francis Trevithick. These later became known as the "Old Crewe" types.
After the creation of the LNWR in 1846, Crewe and Wolverton became headquarters of the Northern and Southern Divisions respectively, with Longsight as the headquarters of the North Eastern Division.
In 1857, the North Eastern Division locomotive department, with headquarters at Longsight, was absorbed into that of the Northern Division. Trevithick was dismissed and returned to Cornwall with an honorarium, and was replaced at Crewe by John Ramsbottom as Northern Division Superintendent. Ramsbottom began to standardise and modernise the locomotive stock, initially replacing the 2-4-0 goods engines with his "DX" 0-6-0, of which over 900 were built at Crewe from 1858 to 1872.
All LNWR locomotives were painted black from 1873; for many years the goods engines were plain black, but passenger engines were given red, white and blue-grey lining, and most goods engines were similarly lined from the 1890s. Before 1873 locomotives had been green with black lines, and this seems to have been the normal livery from London & Birmingham and Grand Junction times.
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.
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 enlarged company was grouped into the LMS, and Hughes became CME of the new railway.
LNWR Southern Division
The first Southern Division Locomotive Superintendent was Edward Bury who had been in charge of the London and Birmingham Railway locomotive department at Wolverton since before that railway opened. He resigned in 1847 and later became General Manager of the Great Northern Railway. His successor at Wolverton was James McConnell who had previously worked for the Birmingham and Gloucester Railway at their Bromsgrove works. Among the classes built under his superintendence were the very successful 2-2-2 "Bloomers", developed from a Bury design, and the Wolverton Express Goods 0-6-0 class, built from 1854 to 1863. The Southern Division's trains were longer and heavier, and 0-6-0 locos had been introduced as early as 1845.
There were distinct differences between the Southern and Northern Division locomotive policies. Wolverton had been set up in 1838 for repair work only, the locomotives being purchased from outside firms, whereas Crewe, from its foundation in 1843, was a locomotive-building works. Only a dozen locomotives were built at Wolverton from 1845 to the end of 1854, but in the following year construction started in earnest, and another 154 were completed in 1855–1863. The Southern Division engines were bigger, heavier and more expensive than those of the Northern Division, and after a disagreement with the cost-conscious Chairman, Richard Moon, in 1862 McConnell was obliged to resign. The Southern and Northern locomotive departments were amalgamated, and John Ramsbottom became Locomotive Superintendent of the entire LNWR, his headquarters remaining at Crewe. Locomotive building and repairing were gradually run down at Wolverton, which became the LNWR's carriage works in 1865.
In the 1850s on the Southern Division, McConnell had some of his express engines painted green with more elaborate patterns of lining in various colours, and in 1861–62 a few Southern Division engines were painted a very dark plum-red. The widespread belief that McConnell's engines were painted vermilion is incorrect, despite its constant repetition.
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.
ex Grand Junction Railway 49 Columbine; static exhibit (no tender); National Collection, Science Museum, London (tender in storage at Wroughton, Wiltshire)
A full-size working replica of an LNWR Bloomer Class locomotive, to be numbered 670, was begun at Tyseley in 1986, was 90% completed by 1990, but has never been finished (2022). [66]
A full-size static replica of the same type was built in Milton Keynes, and was exhibited outside the station there from 1991; it was later moved to the Milton Keynes Museum.
A full-size working replica of a LNWR George the Fifth Class was started in 2014, to be numbered and named 2013 Prince George, is still under construction as of 2023. [67]
Baxter, Bertram (1978). Baxter, David (ed.). British Locomotive Catalogue 1825–1923, Volume 2A: London and North Western Railway and its constituent companies. Ashbourne, Derbyshire: Moorland Publishing Company. ISBN0-903485-51-6.
Baxter, Bertram (1979). Baxter, David (ed.). British Locomotive Catalogue 1825–1923, Volume 2B: London and North Western Railway and its constituent companies. Ashbourne, Derbyshire: Moorland Publishing Company. ISBN0-903485-84-2.
Reed, M. C. (1996). The London & North Western Railway. Atlantic Transport Publishers.
Talbot, Edward (1985). An Illustrated History of LNWR Engines. Oxford Publishing Company.
Yeadon, W. B.A Compendium of LNWR Locomotives 1912–1949, Volume 1: Passenger Tender Engines.
Yeadon, W. B.A Compendium of LNWR Locomotives 1912–1949, Volume 2: Goods Tender Engines.
Jack, Harry (2001). Locomotives of the LNWR Southern Division. Railway Correspondence and Travel Society. ISBN0-901115-89-4.
Further reading
Williams, Charles (1992). A register of all the locomotives now in use on the London & North-Western Railway. Crewe. OCLC1052531529. OL26215816M.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)