LNER Route: Leicester to Marylebone

Staverton Road: gcrsr37

Ex-LMS 4-6-0 Stanier 'Black 5' No 45253 heads a down express during the locomotive exchanges in June 1948. Although only six months after nationalisation No 45253 carries the new BR mixed traffic livery, smokebox number plate and the legend 'British Railways' on the tender. British Railways' new CME, Robert Riddles had experienced the destructive influences of the grouping of 123 railway companies into the big four companies (GWR, SR, LMS, LNER) some 25 years earlier and had therefore arranged for a number of trials of different locomotives across the country. Several classes of engines were matched against each other both on their home territory as well on foreign metals. Built by Armstrong Whitworth in September 1936 as LMS No 5253 it was renumbered by British Railways by the simply device of adding 40000 to its LMS number. The locomotive almost survived to the end of steam before being withdrawn from Heaton Mersey (CLC) shed in April 1968.

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