INTRODUCTION

At the start of the twentieth century, the new fangled Atlantic wheel arrangement, which had originated in the United States of America, had been specifically developed for mainline passenger express services and was the one that every railway company wanted to have and to show off.

The first 4-4-2 type tank engines to be built in this country were constructed between 1880 and 1892 for the London, Tilbury and Southend Railway (LTSR) by Sharp, Stewart & Company and Nasmyth Wilson & Company. The LTSR’s 1 class, were numbered 1-36 and had 6′ 1″ driving wheels, with 17″ x 26″ cylinders, which were located outside the frames, instead of the more common inside positioning, and so set a precedent that was always followed by the LTSR for its passenger engines.

They were the first engines actually owned by the LTSR, as previously all train services had been run by the Great Eastern Railway (GER) under contract. Although ostensibly designed by Thomas Whitelegg, there is some proof that the design was actually produced by William Adams, who was then actually working for the GER. Adams is famously known for inventing the ‘Adams axle’, a radial axle that he incorporated in his designs for the London and South Western Railway (LSWR).

Subsequent LTSR 4-4-2T engines – 37-48 – were built between 1897-8 and they had 6′ 6″ driving wheels, with 18″ x 26″ cylinders. They were all later rebuilt with larger boilers and 19″ x 26″ cylinders. Engines 51-68 were built with similar dimensions, but they had bigger boilers and were built in two batches in 1900 and 1903. Engines numbered 79-82, which had 19″ x 26″ cylinders and 6′ 6″ driving wheels, were built in 1909. The last batch had even larger boilers than their predecessors, although the rebuilt 37 class were later given the same type of boiler and were the largest tank engines on the LTSR at that time.

These engines all proved to be very successful and efficient. They were always worked hard, having to work the heavy London to Southend suburban trains, often weighing up to 400 tons, over a route abounding in speed restrictions and gradients which, although they were not exceptionally severe, were in the most inconvenient situations. The final LTSR type proved so efficient that the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMSR), which had absorbed the LTSR in 1912, introduced its own engines of the Atlantic wheel arrangement between 1923 and 1930 but with poor results. Many Atlantics moved far from the Essex suburban lines of their inception and some were put to work in the Midlands, with three of them going to Dundee and four of them into store at Carlisle. Interestingly the first British 4-4-2 tank engines in this country – as well as the world – were of LTSR design!

From 1898, the Great Northern Railway (GNR) went ‘Atlantic mad’ and began a long phase of 4-4-2 construction. H.A. Ivatt of the GNR built a total of sixty of his 4-4-2T engines, in six batches of ten each between 1898 and 1907, for use on local and commuter trains on the GNR’s North London services and also for services in Yorkshire.

The GNR Atlantic tank type engine had 5′ 7½″ coupled wheels, 175lb psi working pressure with 17½″ x 26″ cylinders. After building forty engines, Ivatt increased the cylinder diameter to 18″, for the final twenty engines, with the last one being built in 1907. The first ten engines, 1009, 1010 and 1013-20 were sent to the Leeds area and the next twenty versions, 1501-20 went to London. All but one had a short chimney and dome for underground working, as well as condensing apparatus. The exception, 1501, was fitted with a standard chimney and dome and consequently had its condensing gear removed and was sent to work at Hatfield. In spite of the advent of the more powerful 0-8-2T and 0-6-2T engines, the 4-4-2T versions remained on the King’s Cross services for some years. The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) classed these very useful engines as their Cl2 class and drafted them all over its system; they could be seen in places as widely separated as Hatfield, Bradford, Chester and Louth.

When the first ten examples of the GNR’s Atlantic tank engines were completed, they were sent to the Leeds area with the next twenty examples, 1501-1520, going to London. Here we see 4511, which was one of the London batch, after it had had 3000 added to its number by the LNER at the Grouping. (Author’s Collection)

In May 1898, the same month and year that the fourth member of Ivatt’s Atlantic tank engine design entered service, the first example of an outside-cylinder, 4-4-2, Atlantic type, express passenger tender engine was introduced to the United Kingdom. It was designed by Ivatt for service on the GNR and was numbered 990. It entered service just a few months before the first inside-cylinder 4-4-2 version designed by the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway (LYR), was released. The Ivatt examples were appreciably larger in size than the preceding Ivatt 4-4-0s and Patrick Stirling’s Singles. N° 990 had a large grate area of 26.75sq ft in a long and narrow firebox.

A further ten machines of similar design were built in 1900 and one four-cylinder ‘simple’ variant arrived in 1902. Ivatt then switched over to a prototype engine with a much larger boiler and a very different firebox, after which 990 and its fellows became known generally as small boiler Atlantics, with the new engines known as large boiler Atlantics. Apart from another ten small boiler engines that were built in 1903, Atlantic construction thereafter was confined to the large boiler type on the GNR. Ninety-four examples were constructed over the years 1902-10 and consisted of ninety-one standard two-cylinder ‘simple’ examples and three four-cylinder compound variants. The small boiler Atlantics were nicknamed ‘Klondikes’ after the famous gold rush which was contemporary.

The first member of the new large boiler Atlantics to be constructed was N° 251 and it was completed at Doncaster Works in December 1902. The cylinders, motion, wheel sizes and divisions were all similar to those of the small boiler Atlantic 990 class engines, but there was a slight variation to the main and auxiliary frames at the rear end. The major changes in the boiler and firebox led to dimensions which were exceptional by British standards of the day. With the length between the blast-pipe and the firebox backplate the same as the 990 series, the layout of the new boiler gave an increase of an amazing 72 per cent in evaporative heating surface. The GNR’s pioneer large boiler Atlantic 4-4-2 express passenger engine N° 251, was built by Doncaster Works. The large boiler Atlantics were an unrivalled success and remained in service until the early 1950s.

Ivatt’s large boiler Atlantic 4402 is seen here at speed with a long rake of mixed coaching stock. 4402 was built at Doncaster Works in June 1905 and was given the works number of 1078. Withdrawn from service on 5 August 1947, it was then scrapped at Doncaster Works. (Author’s Collection)

Almost as soon as Herbert Nigel Gresley was appointed the Chief Mechanical Engineer of the GNR, he started to think about large express passenger engines. Ivatt, his predecessor, had already experimented with compound four-cylinder Atlantics with high pressure boilers and wide grate areas. Gresley’s first designs followed these ideas and an old Atlantic engine was suitably modified in 1915. This was followed by plans for two different Pacific designs, one of which was merely an elongated modification of his Atlantic design, although this design was not adopted. The design that was adopted was his 1470 class Pacific 4-6-2 engines, an original design of Gresley. The pacifics became the next development of steam engines after the highly successful Atlantics.

Only three engines were ever officially named by the GNR. The first was the small boiler Atlantic N° 990, Henry Oakley, which was named after the GNR’s General Manager and happily this engine survives in the National Collection. The other two engines were the first of Gresley’s 4-6-2 Pacifics; Great Northern and Sir Frederick Banbury. The next engine to be named appeared after the formation of the LNER in 1923 at the Grouping and this was the immortal Flying Scotsman! Under the LNER’s classification scheme, 990, Henry Oakley, became a C2 class engine and was renumbered to become 3990. It was withdrawn from service from Lincoln depot in October 1937 and is now preserved by the National Railway Museum.

The design that was adopted as the next development of express steam engine after the highly successful large boiler express Atlantics, was the 1470 class, renamed as A1 class Pacifics, which were an original design of Gresley. Two examples were completed by the GNR, with the third one becoming the first steam engine to be completed by the newly formed L&NER. Originally numbered as 1472, the engine eventually became the world famous N° 4472, Flying Scotsman. Here is the ‘power and the glory’ of Flying Scotsman, seen to good effect in this image, as it prepares to depart from Newcastle Station in the mid-1930s. (W.B. Greenfield, courtesy of the NELPG)

The Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway’s John Aspinall was pipped to the post at completing and releasing to traffic his version of the 4-4-2 Atlantic type express engine to the tracks, which in this case, was introduced in 1899, with the GNR getting there in 1898. The speed of the L&Y’s 4-4-0s had earned them the nickname of ‘Flyers’, so these much larger engines were nicknamed ‘Highflyers’, because of their high-pitched boiler and large driving wheels. They were the mainstay of the company’s premier express turns right up until the 1920’s. Here is 711 during the early part of the twentieth century. (Author’s Collection)

We now take a look at some of the other Atlantic-type engines that ran on Britain’s railways.

After Ivatt’s GNR ‘Klondikes’ of 1898 were introduced, the LYR’s Class 7 introduced its class of Atlantic passenger steam engines, which were built to the design of John Aspinall. Forty examples were built between 1899 and 1902. As a result of having a high-pitched boiler that was supposed to increase stability at speed, these engines were known as ‘High-Flyers’! At the Grouping of 1923, they all passed into the ownership of the LMSR and became the LMS’s only Atlantic tender engine class. The LMSR gave them the power classification of 2P. Withdrawals of the class started in 1926 and the last of the class was withdrawn in 1934.

William Adams developed the 4-4-2T type of engine into his successfully famous suburban 415 class engine, which were introduced in 1882 for services on the LSWR and were originally rostered for suburban traffic. With the trailing wheels forming the basis of its ‘Radial Tank’ name, the class became known as ‘Adams Radials’. The first twelve examples were built in 1882 by Beyer, Peacock & Co Ltd and were followed by eighteen more the following year from Robert Stephenson & Company. All these engines had 17½″ x 24″ cylinders and a boiler working at 160lb pressure. The water tank capacity of 1,000 gallons was increased to 1,200 gallons in the later engines but they were otherwise similar engines. They were built in 1884-1885, with twenty built by Dub’s, ten by Stephenson’s and eleven by Neilson’s, making a total in all of seventy-one engines. All were withdrawn between 1921 and 1928, but three examples – British Railways 30582, 30583 and 30584, which were originally the LSWR’s 125, 488 and 520 – worked the Lyme Regis branch line for many years. The final example of an Adams Radial, 488, is preserved on the Bluebell Railway.

While the wheel arrangement and type name Atlantic came to fame in fast passenger services between railroads in the United States by mid-1895, the tank engine variant first made its appearance in the United Kingdom in 1880, when William Adams designed the 1 class 4-4-2T of the London, Tilbury and Southend Railway – LT&SR. This contemporary image shows the evolution of the tank engine on the LNWR, leading up to its version of the Atlantic tank engine. (Author’s Collection)

Apart from the Inner Circle service of London’s underground railway, other routes circumnavigated London, although not forming a complete loop. From 1872, the London & North Western Railway (LNWR) began an Outer Circle service. Trains ran from Broad Street to Mansion House and ran via Willesden Junction and Earl’s Court, diverting a service that had previously run to Victoria. The first 4-4-2 tank engines owned by the LNWR were used to work these Outer Circle trains. Needing engines suitable for this work and other London suburban traffic, they acquired sixteen of the famous Metropolitan 4-4-0 tank engines, between 1868 and 1876. In 1892, Webb converted ten of them to the 4-4-2 wheel arrangement, by removing the condensing gear, fitting cabs and greatly enlarging the coal bunkers. Eventually they found their way to various rural branches.

During the time that the LNWR were operating on the London Underground system, another LNWR 4-4-2T type engine was under construction. In 1904, George Whale, who was a British railway engineer born in Bocking, Essex, and educated in Lewisham, began building his famous Precursor 4-4-0 express engines for the LNWR. Two years later there began to appear from Crewe his version of a 4-4-2T engine, which became known as Precursor tanks. Fifty engines were built and they had 6′ 3″ driving wheels, 19″ x 26″ cylinders and a boiler pressure of 175lb. They proved to be very reliable engines and were used over most of the LNWR system and virtually took over the Euston suburban train services. They were displaced from these services during 1932, with some engines being stationed at Oxenholme just before the Second World War. The last of the class was withdrawn in March 1940.

The 4-4-2T type engine was amongst the first type to be built by the newly formed Great Central Railway (GCR) after the 1923 Grouping. The first example of eight appeared from Gorton Works in 1903, as its 9K class, later becoming the LNER’s C13 class. Vulcan Foundry also built twelve examples in 1903, followed by twenty more from Gorton over the next couple of years. These engines were slightly larger than those built by the GNR, although other dimensions were similar. They had 5′ 7″ coupled wheels, 18″ x 26″ cylinders and had 160lb psi working pressure boilers. In 1907, twelve slightly modified engines were constructed and were classified by the GCR as their 9L class and later they became the LNER’s C14 class. In these versions the water capacity was increased from 1,450 to 1,825 gallons and the bunker capacity was increased from 3 ton 13cwt of coal to 4 ton 6cwt, increasing the weight of the engines in working order by 44 tons. These fifty-two engines were used all over the GCR and were also used on the lines of the Cheshire Lines Committee. They were largely displaced from the Marylebone services by the Robinson A5 class 4-6-2T engines, which appeared in 1911, but when the LNER took over the steam engines of the Metropolitan Railway, several 4-4-2T came back to Neasden to replace the ‘Met’ engines sent north. They didn’t remain long at Neasden and eventually returned to the Chesham branch.

The last numerical member of the I2 class was N° 35, which is seen at Brighton depot with the abbreviated version of the owning companies name – having the ampersand and the R removed. By this time the brakes, which had previously been fitted to the bogie, had been removed. (Author’s Collection)

Immediately before the 1923 Grouping, there was speculation in several railway publications as to whether the London, Brighton & South Coast Railway (LBSCR) eventually intended to operate all of its trains with tank engines. If this had come about, it would have been due largely to the great success of that railway’s well-known I3 series of 4-4-2 tank engines designed by Douglas Earle Marsh, of which the first was turned out of Brighton Works in September, 1906 and which was classified as I1 class. Nine similar engines were built in the next nine months and a second batch of ten followed in 1907. All engines had 17″ x 26″ cylinders and 170lb psi pressure, but the earlier batch, 595-604, had coupled wheelbases of 8′ 9″, whereas the later engines, numbered 1-10, had this cut down to 7′ 7″. Between 1925 and