The

London and North Western Railway The London and North Western Railway (LNWR, L&NWR) was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. In the late 19th century, the LNWR was the largest joint stock company in the world. Dubbed the "Premier Line", the LNWR's main line connec ...

(LNWR) Class A was a class of

steam locomotives A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, oil or, rarely, wood) to heat water in the locomot ...

. From 1893 to 1900,

Crewe Works Crewe Works is a British railway engineering facility located in the town of Crewe, Cheshire. The works, which was originally opened by the Grand Junction Railway in March 1843, employed around 7,000 to 8,000 workers at its peak. In the 1980s ...

built 111 of these engines, which had a three-cylinder compound arrangement, and were designed by Francis Webb. According to the LNWR Society, 110 were built between 1894 and 1900.

Rebuilding

Like the other Webb compounds, they proved problematic, so in 1904

George Whale George Whale (7 December 1842 – 7 March 1910) was an English locomotive engineer who was born in Bocking, Essex, and educated in Lewisham, London. He worked for the London and North Western Railway (LNWR). Career In 1858 he entered the LNWR's ...

began rebuilding these to simple expansion engines. Fifteen were converted to Class C between 1904 and 1906, 62 to Class D between 1906 and 1909, with the remaining 34 rebuilt by Charles Bowen Cooke to Class C1 between 1909 and 1912. All Class D locomotives were later rebuilt to Class G1. Some of them, rebuilt to Class G2A, were still running in 1962.

Classification

The LNWR letter classification system for 8 coupled engines (A, B, C, etc.) was introduced in 1911.

Rebuilding

Classification

References

Further reading