South Eastern & Chatham 4-4-0 Locomotives in Great_Britain

Class D (Locobase 8445)

Data from William John Gordon, Our Home Railways: How They Began and How They Are Worked (London: Frederick Warne & Co, 1910), p. 204 and A T Taylor, Modern British Locomotives (London: E & FN Spon, Ltd, 1907), p. 3.

A Harry Smith Wainwright design before superheating. The class was widely praised for the sheer grace and color in its design. The boiler jacket came in a green that was set off very nicely by the gold pinstriping and orange-red running board. The dome, safety-valve, stand, and stack top (as well as most other fittings) were polished brass. The stack muzzle inspired the nickname "Coppertops". (Atlantic Coast Lines 4-6-0s had the same nickname for the same reason.)

The British National Railway Museum site -- [], last accessed 28 May 2007 -- offers a practical reason for all the flash: "The engines were styled and finished to create a favourable impression with the public by the two small railways companies who were at that time rather low in the public's estimation. This ploy proved to be successful particularly since few other railways went so far in adorning their locomotives."

The boiler jacket came in a green that was set off very nicely by the gold pinstriping and orange-red running board. The dome, safety-valve, stand, and stack top (as well as most other fittings) were polished brass. The stack muzzle inspired the nickname "Coppertops". (Atlantic Coast Lines 4-6-0s had the same nickname for the same reason.)

See Locobase 9445 for the Belpaire-boilered variant that entered service in 1905 and Locobase 2339 for the impressive upgrade wrought by R E Maunsell beginning in 1919.

Class D - Belpaire (Locobase 9445)

See table on Locomotive Cyclopedia of American Practice, p 506 for data as well as J F Gairns, "Some Remarkable Locomotives of 1908," Cassier's Magazine (Vol XXXVI, p. 117) and A T Taylor, Modern British Locomotives (London: E & FN Spon, Ltd, 1907), p. 2.

The latter comments that this variation of the round-top D class that entered service in 1901 (Locobase 8445) could offer good service: "These engines have only moderate dimensions as locomotive dimensions go nowadays, but they do some very fine work. Many of the trains weigh nearly or quite 300 tons, and they work over the hardest main lines out of London; consequently, their performances, even with average speeds of under 50 miles per hour with the best trains, must be reckoned as very praiseworthy under the conditions."

In their coverage of the Franco-British Exhibition of 1908,at which one of these locomotives appeared, the Railway Engineer of August 1908 ran down the list of features and their suppliers: "...it is fitted with Stephenson link motions and steam reversing gear, cambered boiler tubes of Micro copper 1 1/2" diam., Hodge and Spencer's auxiliary bearing springs, an extended smoke-box containing Stone and Co. 's patent regulating blast pipe, ash ejector and louvre spark arrester, steam sanding apparatus, fittings for steam heating the train and the vacuum automatic brake."

Class E (Locobase 2288)

See Ahrons (1927) for data.

HS Wainwright design that was one of the smallest 4-4-0s of the Edwardian period on British railroads. Later rebuilt by Richard Maunsell. See Class E1.

Class E1/Class D1 (Locobase 2329)

Data from "South Eastern & Chatham Railway Rebuilt Superheater Locomotives," Locomotive, Volume XXVI [26], nO. 329 (15 January 1920), pp. 1-2 and Ahrons (1927). See also "SECR D1 Class 4-4-0" on the excellent Southern Railway E-Mail Group's website at [], last accessed 5 December 2020. Beyer, Peacock reworked ten E1s; only the class leader (179) came from Ashford. The first ten D1s also visited Manchester in 1921. Ashford turned out eleven D1s in 1926 (1) and 1927 (10).

These are RE Maunsell rebuilds of earlier SE&CR engines (see Locobase 8445 for the saturated-boiler Ds) using his own return-tube live heat superheater. With larger grates and more superheater area, long-travel piston valves, these engines provided much-needed power for the SECR & Southern for many years. "Their ability combined with their cheapness," says the website [] [no longer active]," made them an excellent investment."

In a response to a paper on Maunsell's engines published in the Journal of Locomotive Engineering ([], visited 19 November 2004), H Holcroft gives numbers to the power. Noting that they had to run over heavy roads with "numerous speed restrictions" on a railway that was limited in axle loading, Holcroft says the rebuilds had a high-horsepower-per-ton ratio and generated 1,000 ihp at 60 mph [96 kph], which suggests a high mean effective pressure. In turn the high MEP "...resulted from a steam-port opening of about 1/2" at 25% cutoff and a very free exhaust, due to the use of Stephenson gear with long travel."

They could hit 70 mph (113 kph) on the level. Holcroft described the D/E in motion quite evocatively: "In riding , these engines gave one the impression of buoyancy and liveliness, of spirited horses which had to be held on a tight rein."

Holcroft notes their service on the 300-ton-per-train boat traffic out of Dover and concludes: "It was a great tribute to Maunsell that such a high standard was maintained by what was little more than a well thought-out and cheaply-effected improvisation."

Their service lasted for decades. Except for Southern 1747 (ex-747), withdrawn in October 1944, all of them were nationalized as part of British Railways in 1948. Three retired in 1950-1951 and the rest were withdrawn in 1959-1961.

Class G (Locobase 10140)

Data from "New SE & C Ry Engines," The Locomotive Magazine, Vol V (March 1900), p.43-44. Also see Charles Rous-Marten, "Some New British Locomotives," The Railway Magazine, (December 1900), p.535

Locobase 7537 shows the four Great North of Scotland four-coupled bogie classes that all shared the same boiler, cylinders, and driver diameters. Among these were five V-class locomotives ordered by William Pickersgill. At the same time the Great North was obtaining its quintet, Neilson built another five for the SE & CR and this entry shows that fivesome.

Rous-Marten commented: "It will be noticed that these new engines differ considerably from any class of predecessors on either of the now-amalgamated Southern lines. They most resemble the earliest type designed and built for the South-Eastern Railway by its late locomotive superintendent, Mr. James Stirling. ...The new locomotives differ still more widely from the later and standard South Eastern engines ...and from the Chatham standard type, with 6ft. 6in. coupled wheels."

After saying what they were not, Rous-Marten celebrated them: "These latter have a notably sturdy and capable look. The driving-wheels are quite large enough for the work they have to do, and, so far, they seem to be giving full satisfaction. One brought in a crowded train of twenty coaches from Margate a few days ago in excellent style."

Class L (Locobase 5797)

Data from "Railway Development in Europe--Germany Builds New British Passenger Expresses" Railway World, Volume LVIII [58], No 8, (August 1914), pp. 634-635.

According to [] (29 Dec 2003), this class

includes the only locomotives ever supplied by a German builder to a British railway.

Twelve of Maunsell's design for a new express passenger engine were ordered from Beyer, Peacock, but that builder was chock-a-block with work in late 1913-early 1914. So the SECR ordered another 10 locomotives from Borsig in Berlin for immediate delivery. Borsig was as good as its word, supplying all 10 in June and July of 1914. Within weeks of the last delivery, the two nations were at war with each other. Beyer's twelve were built in August-October 1914.

Although all had Belpaire fireboxes, the British engines used Robinson-patent superheaters while the German engines naturally used Schmidt firetube. Cylinders and 9" (227 mm) piston valves were both inside the frame.

These were durable locomotives -- every one was taken into the SoutHern in 1923 (adding a "1" to the engine number) and all were given BR numbers (adding a "3" to the Southern number) in 1948.

Class unknown (Locobase 10282)

Data from "Mr Stirling's Engines on the South Eastern Railway," The Locomotive Magazine, Vol VIII (28 Feb 1903), p. 153

As noted in Locobase 10281, these were the first 4-coupled bogies to run on the South Eastern in 1879-1880 and were a product of James Stirling.

The article noted that the engines had received new boilers in 1889 that were little different from the first ones. Beginning in 1900 or so, the class received new boilers with the specifications shown above. As the reader can see, there weren't substantial changes in size, but they did now have a modified firebox with a horizontal grate.