Flying Scotsman: 100 years of a Scottish icon

Later this year, the famous locomotive will fly again, with a series of trips to celebrate her centenary. But many feared this day would never come for an icon the railways which was twice saved from being scrapped – and once circled the globe.

Despite her job uniting the English and Scottish capitals, the story of the Flying Scotsman begins with a rivalry.

Launched in 1862 with the Special Scotch Express, train journeys between London and Edinburgh took a sedate ten hours, including a genteel stop for lunch at York.

READ MORE: Visitor centre wrangle over Flying Scotsman

But in an age obsessed with bigger and better machines, such a leisurely pace would not last for long, and competition between the east coast and west coast lines would see the time cut to just six hours before accidents and labour laws pushed the time back to eight hours.

There it would remain until 1923, and the entrance of Sir Nigel Gresley, Chief Mechanical Engineer of the London and North Eastern Railway.

His new Pacific LNER A-3 class locomotive rolled out of the workshop in Doncaster in 1923, boasting a bigger boiler and the raw power capable of pulling the heaviest loads, including carriages equipped with restaurants, sleeping compartments and even a barber. And the trains were fast.

Five were built, but it was the third – Engine 4472 – which would go on to become an icon. Christened The Flying Scotsman, the working locomotive took pride of place at the 1924 British Empire Exhibition at Wembley, parked alongside George Stephenson’s Rocket.

Apple green, 70ft long, weighing 97 tonnes, with six couple driving wheels each 6ft 8ins in diameter, she caught the eye of King George V, who made headlines by climbing on to the footplate and settling into the padded driver’s seat.

Not only was the locomotive as big as could possibly be built for the British gauge of rail, it was a workhorse, clocking up thousands of miles as it traversed the length between Edinburgh and London.

Four years later the first major milestone in the iconic loco’s life would come, when a new tender allowing a replacement crew to enter the cabin without stopping.

This allowed the first ever non-stop journey between the two capitals, and four years later in 1932 the Flying Scotsman would break 100mph during a test, smashing the UK speed record for a vehicle running on rails.

Other records were broken as the Flying Scotsman entered its golden year. In 1931, the new technology of wireless transmission enabled the results of the Derby to reach to passengers as soon as the race was won.

And in 1932 her crew made headlines when they spoke by telephone to the pilot of an Imperial Airways Heracles overhead.

But even though the Flying Scotsman was in rude health, its days were numbered. By the end of the thirties, she was shunted from the East Coast Main line and ran local routes around Manchester and London. 

During the second world war her famous green coat was replaced with black, and then blue when British Rail was formed in 1948.

By 1963 the locomotive, now colored ‘British Rail Green’ was facing the end. The age of steam power was over and diesel trains were taking their place. It looked as though the Flying Scotsman had run out of rail.

But where the are trains there are train enthusiasts, and one was waiting in the wings. Multi-millionaire Alan Pegler had been in love with 4472 since seeing her as a child at the British Empire Exhibition, and hatched an ambitious plan to revive her fortunes.

Bought for £3,000, the Flying Scotsman was repaired, restored and repainted her famous colors and loaded goods for a Government-sponsored ‘best of British’ trip to the US, complete with actors in Shakespearian outfits and a Winston Churchill impersonator.

Touring cities to promote British industry and endeavor, the Flying Scotsman at first drew in the crowds. But a second trip came off the rails when the government at home changed and decided a steam train was no longer the showcase for Britian they wanted as the jet-set 1970s dawned.

With the money all gone, the Flying Scotsman was stranded, and a trip to the scrapyard loomed once again. But in 1973 construction magnate Sir William McAlpine stepped in, bringing the locomotive home once more.

For the next two decades he would keep the Flying Scotsman running, and even took her to Australia to take part in the country’s bicentennial celebrations.

READ MORE: Flying Scotsman set to steam through Scotland

There, she would make the longest non-stop run by a steam locomotive at 422 miles, travelling between Parkes and Broken Hill, and would become the first locomotive to circumnavigate the globe when her return voyage to the UK was complete.

Over the years, the Flying Scotsman passed through others' hands, and was once the center of a bid to establish a visitor attraction in Edinburgh. 

But now she is part of the National Collection at the National Railway Museum in York, and still capable of taking to the rails despite her venerable age. 

Later this year she will make a string of celebratory centenary trips  - including a four day jaunt from Kings Cross to Aberdeen – giving rail enthusiasts a chance to get up close to this bygone of a vanished age as she thunders down the tracks once again. 

Her iconic presence is a far cry from the modern railway experience of strikes, delays and leaf-on-the-line related mishaps, says poet laureate Simon Armitage, who penned an ode to the Flying Scotsman;s glory to celebrate her centenary.

The poet told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “There’s something very dreamlike about the whole contraption and the experience of standing next to it. 

“There’s just something absolutely incredible when you’re up close and personal with it.” 

Mr Armitage said he wanted to celebrate the “analogue world”, when people had “an actual relationship with physical objects. 

“I think in the digital world it’s often a very detached and dispassionate experience.”