The Great Northern Railway GNR Class A1 1470 Great Northern was the first of 52 A1 class locomotives. It has also represented three distinct stages in the history of the British "Pacific" steam locomotives designed by

Nigel Gresley Sir Herbert Nigel Gresley (19 June 1876 – 5 April 1941) was a British railway engineer. He was one of Britain's most famous steam locomotive engineers, who rose to become Chief Mechanical Engineer (CME) of the London and North Eastern Rai ...

. For the Great Northern Railway (GNR), a constituent company of the London and North Eastern Railway before the amalgamation of 1923, for which they became a standard design. Eventually ''Great Northern'' was completely rebuilt as Class A1/1.

History

''Great Northern'' is historically significant because it was the first Pacific to be built by the Great Northern Railway as a prototype of the new '1470 class'. It was also the only original A1 to not be rebuilt by the

LNER LNER may refer to: *London and North Eastern Railway, a railway company in the United Kingdom from 1923 until 1947 *London North Eastern Railway, a train operating company in the United Kingdom since 2018 * Liquid neutral earthing resistor, a type ...

as an A3. However it was still renumbered by replacing the first two numerals to '44' making the number 4470. The locomotive was named ''Great Northern'' in honour of the GNR (Great Northern Railway). Just after

WWII World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, ''Great Northern'' was completely rebuilt by Edward Thompson as his A1/1.

Liveries

As built, ''Great Northern'' was painted in GNR apple green with brown framing. In October 1923, it was repainted into LNER lined apple green with black framing. This livery had two variations, one with 'LNER 1470N' on the tender, and the other variant had only "LNER" on the tender and 4470 on the cab sides. Finally, in February 1942, it was repainted plain black, lettered "LNER". In July 1942, the LNER started using the simplified lettering "NE" on black locomotives, and 4470 ''may'' have been so treated after that date. The locomotive originally bore its number 1470 on the cab side. When first repainted into LNER livery, the number was altered to 1470N, which was placed on the tender, below the letters "LNER". In March 1925, it was renumbered 4470, and at some point after May 1928, the number was moved back to the cab sides.

Rebuild

''Great Northern'' was rebuilt once in its career, by the

to the design of Edward Thompson to become his A1/1.

Models

Hornby Hornby may refer to: Places In England * Hornby, Lancashire * Hornby, Hambleton, village in North Yorkshire * Hornby, Richmondshire, village in North Yorkshire Elsewhere * Hornby, Ontario, community in the town of Halton Hills, Ontario, Canad ...

released a OO gauge model of ''Great Northern'' as built in early LNER style apple green livery with black framework, and original tender with "LNER 1470N" written on both sides. L.H Loveless & Co also released an

O gauge O scale (or O gauge) is a scale commonly used for toy trains and rail transport modelling. Introduced by German toy manufacturer Märklin around 1900, by the 1930s three-rail alternating current O gauge was the most common model railroad scal ...

model of ''Great Northern'' in its original GNR Apple Green Livery with a brown chassis and framework.

References

* * * {{LNER Locomotives

1470 Year 1470 ( MCDLXX) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. Events January–December * March 12 – Wars of the Roses in England – Battle of Losecoat Field: The Ho ...

4-6-2 locomotives Railway locomotives introduced in 1922 Standard gauge steam locomotives of Great Britain NBL locomotives Scrapped locomotives