My friends at The Transport Treasury based locally to me in High Wycombe, have this week published two new Southern related books both written by two very well known authors. Firstly, good friend Mike King has written the second volume of his Southern Coaches Survey, and Secondly, a bit of a surprise being Locomotives of the Southern Railway Part 3 by D.L Bradley.
Southern Coaches Survey Volume 2
Southern Coaches Survey 2 is the next in Mike King’s series on Southern Railway rolling stock. The format follows that established in the first volume published in late 2019, which covered a range of pre-grouping coaches and BR Mk1s on the Southern, with 192 pages, more than 70 4mm scale drawings and 150 photographs, carriage and set numbering tables and will enable modellers in particular to reproduce these trains in their chosen modelling scale.
In this volume he concentrates on ex-LSWR vehicles – from Victorian six-wheelers through to corridor coaches, LCDR bogie vehicles and SER six-wheelers, with a full record of the coaches themselves, their construction dates and details, dimensions, history and final withdrawal from traffic, their set formations and the duties upon which they were employed.
Stock covered include:
- LSWR Six wheels stock
- LSWR Arc-roof bogies stock
- LSWR Shorter non-corridor stock
- LSWR corridor stock
- LCDR Bogies stock
- SER Six wheel stock
- There is also a record of a complete days’ observation at Eastleigh for Whit Saturday, 1932.
The book will also appeal to all those interested in the Southern Railway. Mike states that there is a 3rd volume planned to cover the ex SECR ‘Birdcage’ stock, more LBSC vehicles and the outstanding BR Mk1 vehicles.
Locomotives of the Southern Railway Part 3 by D.L Bradley.
The name D L Bradley will certainly be known to most enthusiasts of the Southern Railway, indeed his locomotive histories still stand proud more than five decades since they were first published.
His Locomotives of the Southern Railway parts one and two, covering Southern built locomotives up to the Bulleid pacifics, were first published by The Railway Correspondence and Travel Society in 1975 & 1976 respectively. These books have proved to be invaluable sources of information to railway historians and modellers alike.
It was however an incomplete series, Part 3 of Locomotives of the Southern Railway featuring the history of the Southern Electric locos CC1/2 & 20003, Bulleid’s 500hp diesel shunter 11001, Leader and main-line diesel electric locomotives 10201-3 was never released. That is until now, when the manuscript was found by chance in consequence of a house clearance. The format and size of this new Part 3, containing 96 pages with 38 black and white photographs, nicely matches that of Parts 1 & 2 but in a distinctly different green to help differentiate.
Both these new books, I can whole heartedly recommend as a satisfied customer, can be obtained direct from The Transport Treasury here