19/09/2025
Just released today we have the much-awaited final instalment to the trilogy with
Main Line to The South - Part 3: Swaythling, St.Denys, Northam, Southampton Terminus and Southampton Central.
The London and Southampton Railway opened its line in 1840, the first major railway in the south of England – soon to become the London & South Western Railway and eventually in 1923 the Southern Railway. Part 1 was concerned with the line from Basingstoke to Wi******er. Continuing our journey, Part Two describes the line through to Eastleigh and beyond to Swaythling.
Once again, we cover in great detail all facets of the construction, opening and operation of the line over the many decades with our usual extensive use of maps, plans and diagrams. Every archive, contemporary account or historical description has been thoroughly investigated in depth and presented as part of the narrative.
A central pillar of Part Three is inevitably the great and continuingly important operating centre within Southampton's once vast railway network within the docks complex.
The line gathered frenzied interest in the 1960s as the last steam-worked main line in England until its electrification in July 1967.
Today the line between Basingstoke and Southampton carries not only heavy passenger traffic but, with the demise of coal traffic elsewhere, some of the nation’s heaviest freight traffic, in the shape of containers from Southampton Docks.
The print run for Part Three has been much reduced meaning there will be no discounts and that this title is likely to mirror the sales of the late 2024 released volume on LSWR Signalling which sold out within 90 days. There will not be a reprint undertaken; therefore, we urge customers not to delay securing their copies.
248 Pages packed with exclusive previously unseen black & white archive photographs. HARDBACK
Main Line to The South - Part 3: Swaythling, St.Denys, Northam, Southampton Terminus and Southampton Central The London and Southampton Railway opened its line in 1840, the first major railway in the south of England – soon to become the London & South Western Railway and eventually in 1923 th...
