BW156

London, Midland and Scottish Railway Company Limited

Records of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway Company Limited

1923-1948

BW156

These records are available immediately for research

The London, Midland & Scottish Railway (LMS) was created in 1923 as a result the 1921 Railway Act, passed as many of Britain's railway companies were close to bankruptcy following the First World War. Four large companies were created: London, Midland & Scottish Railway; London & North Eastern Railway; Great Western Railway; and the Southern Railway. These four groups were expected to be better managed and increasingly profitable. Of the four railways formed in 1923, the LMS was the largest. It was the only British railway serving England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, and excluding the Irish Northern Counties Committee and certain joint lines, its route mileage was 6,758 in 1935. The LMS was made up of seven constituent and twenty-seven subsidiary companies. The seven constituent companies were the London & North Western, the Midland, the North Staffordshire, and the Furness Railways in England, and the Caledonian, Glasgow & South Western, and Highland Railways in Scotland. Many of these had already assimilated scores of smaller lines. The management of the companies was re-organised into a single hierarchy directed from London. The company was divided into the Western Division (most of the former London & North Western Railway), the Midland Division (former Midland Railway), the Central Division (Lancashire and Yorkshire), and the Northern Division (including all the three Scottish lines). The LMS owned the largest stock of locomotives, carriages and wagons in Britain, as well as road motor vehicles and over 8,400 horses in 1935. It also possessed 49 steamboats (four jointly owned); 537 miles of canal; numerous hotels; and docks, harbours and wharves. In 1948 the four large companies were nationalised and merged to form British Railways under the umbrella of the British Transport Commission. For further information, see The LMS Society at http://www.lmssociety.org.uk/ and Mike's Railway History: The Way It Was In 1935 at http://mikes.railhistory.railfan.net/r031.html.