The LCDR C class or Europa Class was a class of steam locomotives of the

London, Chatham and Dover Railway The London, Chatham and Dover Railway (LCDR or LC&DR) was a railway company in south-eastern England created on 1 August 1859, when the East Kent Railway was given parliamentary approval to change its name. Its lines ran through London and no ...

(LCDR). The class was designed by

William Martley William Martley (4 January 1824 – 6 February 1874) was the locomotive superintendent of the London Chatham and Dover Railway (LCDR) in England from 1860 until his death. Biography William was born in Ballyfallon, in County Meath, Ireland, in 1 ...

and introduced in 1873, intended for the heaviest express services between London and Dover.

History

The LCDR was successful in winning a government contract for the delivery of British mails to the Continent from the South Eastern Railway (SER) in 1873 and required a new class of locomotives for the mail trains as the punctuality of these services was essential to its retention.

the locomotive superintendent of the railway designed the class and obtained permission for four locomotives to be built by

Sharp, Stewart and Company Sharp, Stewart and Company was a steam locomotive manufacturer, initially located in Manchester, England. The company was formed in 1843 upon the demise of Sharp, Roberts & Co.. It moved to Glasgow, Scotland, in 1888, eventually amalgamating wit ...

at a cost of £2,930 per locomotive to be delivered by October 1873. These were named ''Europa'', ''Asia'', ''Africa'' and ''America'' but were unnumbered. The locomotives performed well and Martley therefore sought authority to purchase a further five, but this request was refused. He was however granted authority to build the locomotives at the company’s own Longhedge workshops in 1874. Work on two of these had barely started at the time of Martley’s death in the same year. Construction of these was halted, but eventually restarted and completed in 1876 by Martley’s successor William Kirtley, although the order for the three remaining examples was cancelled. The boilers for these three were later used by Kirtley for other purposes. The two new locomotives were numbered 57 and 58 and the remaining members of the class were numbered 53-56. These numbers were increased by 459 to become 512–517 following the amalgamation of the LCDR and SER to become the South Eastern and Chatham Railway in 1899. Under William Kirtley's classification scheme the locomotives became the 'C class'.

Use

The class were used on both the Dover- Calais

boat train A boat train is a passenger train operating to a port for the specific purpose of making connection with a passenger ship, such as a ferry, ocean liner, or cruise ship. Through ticketing is normally available. __NOTOC__ Notable named boat tr ...

s and after May 1876 on new services to

Flushing Flushing may refer to: Places * Flushing, Cornwall, a village in the United Kingdom * Flushing, Queens, New York City ** Flushing Bay, a bay off the north shore of Queens ** Flushing Chinatown (法拉盛華埠), a community in Queens ** Flushin ...

via Queenborough Pier. After 1876 they were replaced on the heaviest services by the

LCDR M class The LCDR M class was a class of 4-4-0 steam locomotives of the London, Chatham and Dover Railway. The class was designed by William Kirtley and introduced in 1877, intended for the heaviest express services between London and Dover. History ...

although they continued to be used on express services until the turn of the century and were considered to be sufficiently useful to be worth re-boilering between 1890 and 1892.

Withdrawal

The class began to be withdrawn and scrapped from December 1907 and all were gone by April 1909. The four earliest examples had then each completed a mileage of more than one million miles.

References

* {{SECR locomotives Europa 2-4-0 locomotives Railway locomotives introduced in 1873 Scrapped locomotives Sharp Stewart locomotives