Catalogue description Stratford Locomotive Works photographic collection

This collection includes images of newly completed locomotives and rolling stock, stations, depots and staff at work with views of the workshops at Stratford and Temple Mills Wagon Works.

There is a handwritten register ordered alphabetically and numerically. Large numbers of cyanotype reference prints are available for consultation by special request.

Stratford Locomotive Works

• Railway transport

The Eastern Counties Railway's Stratford Locomotive Works opened in 1847 on the outskirts of London, and the first locomotives were completed four years later. In 1862 the ECR became part of the Great Eastern Railway, and in the years that followed engines built at Stratford included the Clauds, B12s and T19s. In 1891 Stratford Works set a new world record for locomotive erection, the workforce assembling an 0-6-0 freight engine in just 9½ hours.

In 1923 the GER was absorbed into the LNER, which ceased production of new locomotives at the works the following year. Locomotives were still serviced at Stratford, however, and during the Second World War the works also built aircraft components and artillery parts. The works continued to repair British Railways vehicles on nationalisation, but was closed in 1962.