GWR Collett Castle Class

A history of Britain's most powerful passenger locomotives.

The Castle class four-six-zero locomotives designed by Charles Collett and built at Swindon Works were the principal passenger locomotives of the Great Western Railway. The four-cylinder locomotives were built in batches between 1923 and 1950, the later examples being constructed after nationalisation by British Railways. In total 171 engines of the class were built and they were originally to be seen at work all over the Great Western Railway network, and later working on the Western Region of British Railways. The highly successful class could be described as a GWR work in progress, because further development took place over almost all of the locomotives working lives. In addition to inspiring other locomotive designers the Castle class engines were proved to be capable of outstanding performances, with some of them surviving in service for over forty years, and individually clocking up just a little short of two million miles in traffic.

In GWR Collett Castle Class, Keith Langston provides a definitive chronological history of the iconic class together with archive photographic records of each GWR Castle locomotive. Many of the 300 plus images are published for the first time. In addition, background information on the origin of the names the engines carried, including details of the many name changes which took place, are also included. The extra anecdotal information adds a fascinating glimpse of social history.

A lavishly illustrated factual reference book, GWR Collett Castle Class will delight steam railway enthusiasts in general and in particular those with a love of all things Great Western.