BRITISH RAILWAY PICTORIAL: Crewe North

There are few more famous places in the railway history in the British Isles than Crewe, home to the London & North Western Railway’s workshops and a major junction on the West Coast main line. Crewe was the gateway to the northwest, to Liverpool, Manchester, North Wales and many other destinations. To the north of the town, an intricate network of lines, some of which dated back to the dawn of the railway age, served a wide range of industries and centres of population. Largely dominated by the LNWR, the area was, however, also served by the Cheshire Lines Committee, over whose metals the locomotives of the Great Central and later the LNER operated and there was also a Great Western presence at Crewe. Today much of the network is still in use, although the many classes of steam locomotives that once graced Crewe have been consigned to preservation or the history books, whilst Crewe works itself is but a pale shadow of its former glory.

This volume aims to recapture the atmosphere of the main line between Crewe and Warrington in the days of steam, with just an occasional glimpse of the machines that followed. Compiled by the late Alan Wilkinson, who was born and brought up alongside the line and whose enthusiasm for railways was kindled watching the express services over the West Coast main line, the book includes some 200 mono illustrations portraying the railways to the north of Crewe during the steam era. Alongside the fascinating pictorial selection, the book also includes the author’s detailed narrative recording the history of railway development in the area, the importance of the salt industry and the rise of Crewe Works.

As an exercise in nostalgia, British Railway Pictorial: Crewe North will also be of interest to all those who grew up in the area during the 1950s and 1960s and saw the final flowering of steam over the West Coast main line as well as those absorbed by the local history and industrial archaeology of the area covered by the book.

Locations featured in the book include; Crewe, Monks Coppenhall, Coppenhall Junction, Minshull Vernon, Winsford, Nun House Bridge, Cheshire Amalgamated Salt Works, Wharton Common, Over, Winsford Junction, Salt Union Wagon Works, Smokehall, Verdin Sidings, Newbridge Salt Works, Vale Royal Viaduct, Hartford, Douglas Siding, Gorstage, Wallerscote Light Railway, Weaverham Road, Weaverham, Winnington, Acton Bridge, Dutton Viaduct, Weaver Junction, Birdswood, Preston Brook, Norton Crossing, Moore, Acton Grange and Warrington.