GWR Armstrong Class

Description

The Great Western Railway Class 7 or more commonly known as the “Armstrongs” were a group of only four prototype 4-4-0 double framed locomotives built at Swindon Works in 1894. Due to the success of the GWR Dean Singles, the 4-4-0s were nearly an exact copy of them.
They started off being rebuilds of four of Dean’s “Experimental Locomotives”, Nos. 7, 8, 14 and 16. Had it not been for the recent derailing of one of his 3001 Class 2-2-2s in Box Tunnel, these engines would probably been built as 2-2-2s. In any case, they emerged as double-framed 4-4-0s with elements such as boilers, bogie and many other common parts used on the Dean Single 3031 Class.

The four locomotives, which with their double-curved running plates were one of the most elegant machines ever out shopped from Swindon works & marked an end of pure Victorian style engineering with names to commemorate some of the most influential men of the GWR.

No. 14 “Charles Saunders” who was Secretary & Superintendent of the Great Western Railway.

No. 8 “Gooch” named after the first Superintendent of the GWR, Sir Daniel Gooch

No. 7 “Armstrong” named after the second Superintendent of the GWR, Joseph Armstrong

and No. 16 “Brunel” obviously named after the most famous civil engineers in history, Isambard Kingdom Brunel

They would most commonly be seen running express trains between London and Bristol, but with the arrival of George Jackson Churchward and his City & Star Class, they were displaced and moved to Wolverhampton and worked north from there. Unfortunately, this would mark the beginning of the end of the class. They were often said of having the style and grace of the Singles but not having the steam or power to follow suit. Also given the imminent Churchward Standardization policy, the class would have a target on them.
Between 1915 and 1923, all four were rebuilt into GWR Flower Class and given Standard No. 2 boilers. Where they would live out the rest of their lives working as station pilots and handling local traffic on the northern sections. The last survivor No. 4169 “Charles Saunders” being withdrawn in 1930.