LB&SCR A1 Class

LB&SCR A1 Class

The London, Brighton and South Coast Railway (LB&SCR) A1 Class is an English class of 0-6-0T steam locomotive. Designed by William Stroudley, 50 members of the class were built in 1872 and between 1874 and 1880, all at Brighton Works. The class have received several nicknames, initially being known as "Rooters" by their south London crews. However, the engines were more famously known as "Terriers" on account of the distinctive 'bark' of the exhaust beat. Later in their careers, some engines were known as "Hayling Billy" on account of their work on the Hayling Island branch line. A pub of this name on the island was briefly home to the engine which is now No.W8 Freshwater.

After displacement from their original workings out of London Bridge and London Victoria by more powerful locomotives from the D class and the early stages of the LB&SCR overhead electrification scheme, some representatives of the class were sold to other operators, while the majority of the remainder were put to work on branch lines in Sussex and on non-revenue earning work such as shunting.

With these new uses being found, the class remained in use on the system, surviving to be taken into ownership by the Southern Railway from 1923 and by British Railways from 1948. Although the number of engines dwindled following the Second World War as the work they were used for was either dieselised or lost to rail through the closure of branch lines and yards, a number continued in operation through into the 1960s, most famously on the Hayling Island line in Hampshire. The withdrawal of the final members of the class finally came in 1963, the line to Hayling having closed in November 1963.

Eight members of the class went on to be purchased privately for preservation, with two other examples being donated by British Railways to the Canadian Railway Museum and the National Railway Museum. One of these engines, No.55 Stepney, is best known as being the first locomotive to arrive at the Bluebell Railway, which was itself the first preserved standard gauge steam-operated passenger railway in the world when it opened in August 1960, and also for appearing in Stepney the "Bluebell" Engine, one of the books in the original Railway Series written by the Reverend W. Awdry which also gave birth to Thomas the Tank Engine.