ABSTRACT
Edwardian railway carriages, like the engines which drew them, were rich in their variety of colour and design. The period also spanned a great advance in passenger comfort though at its beginning much accommodation was extremely spartan. In 1900 the four-wheel ‘bumper’ was still common and almost universal on suburban and branch-line trains. Usually lit by gas, such a coach had no means of heating and its riding qualities were far from comfortable. The vehicles of seventy years ago showed strongly their derivation from the stage-coach: the stout timbers, the graceful curves, the neat panelling and so much evidence of good workmanship including the beautiful finish of lining out and varnishing. Carriage designers were slow to utilise the full width of the loading gauge, which can permit a width of nine feet, until late into the first decade of the century. Edwardian rolling stock or track might not have produced today’s smoothness but it had compensations.
