Catalogue description The Russell-Smith collection of railway photographs

It is composed of high quality glass and film negatives, including some excellent photographs of country branch lines. Russell-Smith preferred to photograph the Great Western and its successor, British Railways' Western Region, although Eastern and Southern lines are also represented in his collection. There are also photographs of locomotives on GWR lines operating out of their normal area during the 1948 exchanges. A handwritten register, compiled by Russell-Smith, lists dates, places, classes of locomotive and types of train. There are also reference prints of some of these images in the Reading Room.

Russell-Smith, J F, fl 1947-1958, member of the Railway Photographic Society

Smith, J F, Russell-, fl 1947-1958, member of the Railway Photographic Society

• Railway transport

The NRM acquired the Russell-Smith collection in 1980. He had a long-standing interest in railways and although he began taking railway photographs somewhat late in life he soon achieved recognition for the high standard of his work when his images were published by the railway press in the 1950s.