Last Updated on April 23, 2026
A History of the LMS, 3. The War Years and Nationalisation, 1939-48 (Steam Past).
This is the final volume of the three-volume
HISTORY OF THE LMS by O. S. Nock. It deals with the LMS at war from 1939 to 1945 and the three remaining years until it was nationalised, and thus completes the history of the quarter-century of the line’s existence.
War for the railways began at once – Government control, total black-out at night, instant mass evacuation of children from big cities. In the 1939-40 first winter of the war, the weather in the worst of all winters did not help. War meant improvising the sudden mass dispersal of 300,000 troops from Dunkirk, coping with devastation to track, buildings and vehicles, and with unexploded bombs, from the night raids throughout the winter of 1940-41. There were shortages of everything – material, staff, locos, rolling stock. Ships and hotels were requisi-tioned. Workshops were switched from repairs and construction to tanks and munitions.
The author tells how to a man the LMS team in the face of countless similar unforeseeable hazards responded to the wartime challenge to keep traffic moving. He gives revealing insights into their reactions and behaviour during the war, and the loss of morale afterwards as nationalisation loomed.
His comparisons of wartime timetables and steam locomotive performance with pre-war make intriguing reading.
The LMS emerged from the war run-down and exhausted, but grappled with its post-war problems in typical style – it pioneered British main line diesel electric locos. When at the end of 1947 it was finally nationalised, the new British Transport Commission drew heavily for its ideas on LMS experi-ence, practice and people. It was an end not unworthy of an impressive career.
This book was previously for sale at Margot’s Books. The shop is now closed — this post is kept as an archive record only.
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