traditional Christmas and New Year holidays at Sandringham.5 The last time a royal train was used at Wolferton was in 1966, and the railway branch line closed in 1969.
British Railways Board
The GWR carriage built for Queen Victoria did not have a dining car or toilet, as Her Majesty would not use either while the train was in motion. It did have a signal on the roof to tell the engine driver to slow down.
One of the royal saloons built for the use of Queen Victoria in 1869 by the London and North Western Railway.
Having a member of the royal family use your company’s carriages bestowed honour far out of all proportion, and from the earliest days of train travel, royal trains always encompassed the very latest in rail technology, with each of the railway companies, whether in Britain. Australia, or Canada, vying to outdo their rivals. It was also a means for the railways to try out, on the most fastidious, most discriminating passengers, innovations like heating, toilets, and dining cars before introducing them to the general public. If the GWR built the first eight-wheeler coach for Queen Victoria in 1842, the following year the London and Birmingham Railway was the first to put heating into the saloon they hired out to the royal household. Ingeniously hidden between the plush ottomans, the Louis XIV chairs, and the Axminster carpet was a closed-circuit hot-water pipe heated by four oil burners. In 1851, the South Eastern Railway built the most conspicuous royal carriage to date. A six-wheeler, with the principal saloon twelve feet in length between two coupes, it was highly ornate, the walls padded in amber, white, and damask. At one end was a huge state chair, as the saloon was to be a travelling Throne Room. There was also for the first time a closet at one end that contained a lavatory, which, so as not to offend Victorian sensibilities, was cleverly disguised to look like anything but a toilet. Before that, if the Queen wanted to use such facilities, her train stopped at the nearest station — which meant that every station en route had to be prepared for a royal visit.
In 1861, the London and North Western Railway (LNWR) put the first full-length bed on a royal train, and eight years later the same company also built the first British railway coaches to be connected by a flexible concertina “bellows,” or gangway. It would be another two decades before these appeared on the trains that Victoria’s subjects used. But Her Majesty mistrusted these gangways and still insisted that the train be stopped whenever she wanted to walk from one carriage into the other. Similarly, Her Majesty refused to take her meals while the train was in motion. She felt the same about the use of gas and electricity for illumination, which in 1893 the LNWR fitted to her carriages, preferring instead oil lamps and candles. Her apprehension of electricity did not prevent her ringing the immense electric bells that were mounted in the compartments of her ladies-in-waiting to summon her staff. Finally, the Queen was also sensitive about what she viewed from the train. When passing through the slums of industrial Britain, not wanting to be affected by the suffering of her people, she had the blinds in her carriage lowered.
C-081691
Specially built observation car used by the Prince of Wales in 1860 for the opening of the Victoria Bridge, Montreal.
Queen Victoria’s best-known saloons were the twin six-wheelers built by the LNWR in 1869 to take her to Balmoral twice a year, and today one is preserved at the National Railway Museum, York. In 1897, now an old lady. Her Majesty was even more cautious: when the GWR wanted to honour her by building a replacement for her old saloon, she warned them: “Build a new train and as fine as you wish, but leave the private apartment in my carriage as it is. Through the skill of the Swindon craftsmen, her old salon was successfully incorporated into the very latest design. It had three different types of lighting — gas in the brake carriages, electricity in the remainder of the train — but only oil lighting in Her Majesty’s saloon.
Royal saloon built for the use of King Edward VII in 1902 by London and North Western Railway.
It was her son Edward VII who was truly the Railway King. Born in 1841, he had never known (as his mother had) a world before steam, and had no qualms of sleeping, dining, or doing anything else on a train. During his nine-year reign, he would travel by royal train constantly (and quickly, insisting that the speed be raised) in England. Scotland, Wales, and Ireland and on the continent. As he smoked cigars, his mother did not like him using her personal saloon. In any case, he would not have been seen in his mother’s old LNWR carriages — as a true gentleman. His Royal Highness preferred to be surrounded by furnishings of teak and leather, rather like a moving gentleman’s club. In 1897, Edward had his own royal train built for him by the London, Brighton & South Coast Railway (LBSC). His Royal Highness bestowed his patronage on this line because it connected a number of racecourses together, places that his mother frowned upon but which her son frequented. The Brighton Royal Train, as it was called, consisted of five eight-wheel bogie carriages: two saloons for the household, two for the luggage, and one for His Royal Highness — and sometimes Princess Alexandra.
The Prince of Wales was the first member of the royal family to use a train in Canada during his 1860 tour. The Canadian Pacific Railway, then barely begun on its transcontinental route, built a special carriage and an observation car for him. His Royal Highness travelled from Montreal to Toronto, opening public gardens, dancing at balls, planting trees, and chatting with specially selected “ordinary people.” He took to the tour with gusto.
Prince Edward’s brother, the almost unknown Prince Alfred, was less fortunate. The first member of the royal family to visit Australia, he arrived by battleship in 1867 and toured Adelaide, Melbourne, and Sydney, receiving everywhere a tumultuous welcome — except in Clontarf, Sydney, where on March 12, 1868, Irish patriot Henry James O’Farrell shot him. O’Farrell was arrested (before he could be lynched), convicted, and then hanged. The prince made a quick recovery and was able to leave Australia by early April, but the national disgrace persisted until the turn of the century, when the country was once more thought safe for Royal Tours.
When Edward became king in 1901, the LNWR retaliated against the LBSC’s Brighton train by designing its own grand creation. Costing an estimated $300,000, this train was constructed at its works in Wolverton, following the King’s suggestion that “it look as much like a yacht as possible,” and presented along with its own locomotive to His Majesty in December 1902, causing one American newspaper to comment that His Majesty had been given the ultimate boy’s Christmas gift of a complete train. This was untrue, as the train (like all royal trains) remained the property of the company, and the royal household was always charged first-class fare plus the rate per mile for a special train. Of the two suites on the LNWR train, the King’s had a smoking room, a day compartment, a bedroom with dressing room attached, and a saloon. Mahogany, inlaid with rosewood and satinwood, featured heavily in the smoking room; the leather chairs were comfortably upholstered, and the curtains, carpet, and general fittings harmonized in this dark colour scheme. In contrast, the adjoining compartment used by Her Majesty was in white enamel, decorated in the Colonial style, and the furniture was in satinwood, with inlays of ivory and green predominating. Electric heaters were built in, so that Their Majesties could adjust the temperature, while for the summer, electric “waving” fans were provided. Modern comforts supplied in the royal saloon even included the provision of electric cigar-lighters. Queen Alexandra’s bedroom was draped in delicate pink with silver-plated fittings. Adjoining was Her Majesty’s dressing room, similar in design, but with inlaid satinwood furniture, while next to it was another dressing room, no less ornate, for the use of Princess Victoria.
