Mallard

[lockhart flawse]

Evening,



I can't find anywhere else to post this but as I had some great help with the last query I posted on this forum here goes: my 11 year old son did a talk on the Mallard today for his ESB and someone asked him why it was named Mallard.



Anyone know?



L.F.

[Zad]

The quick answer is that almost of them were named after birds:

Wikipedia said:

The first four locomotives included the word 'silver' in their names, because they were intended to haul the 'Silver Jubilee' train. The next batch of A4s were named after birds, particularly those that were fast flyers; Gresley being a keen ornithologist. Five (4488 - 4492) were named after commonwealth countries to haul the new Anglo-Scottish 'Coronation' train and three (4495 - 4497); intended to haul the new 'West Riding Limited' received names with 'golden' in the title, these being connected to the wool trade: Golden Fleece and Golden Shuttle, although Golden Plover's link was a little more tenuous.



A4 No.4498 was the hundredth Gresley pacific to be built and someone had the idea of naming it after the designer himself, which was a nice gesture. Unfortunately however this did start a rash of renamings of other A4s, usually of directors of the LNER and many of the more obscure bird names (and a few of the better ones: Kestrel, Osprey for example) were exchanged for somewhat less inspiring names.

[Eric Mc]

I hope he didn't "Duck" the question.

[lockhart flawse]

Thanks Zod.....

[johnych]

Zad said:

The quick answer is that almost of them were named after birds:

Wikipedia said:

The first four locomotives included the word 'silver' in their names, because they were intended to haul the 'Silver Jubilee' train. The next batch of A4s were named after birds, particularly those that were fast flyers; Gresley being a keen ornithologist. Five (4488 - 4492) were named after commonwealth countries to haul the new Anglo-Scottish 'Coronation' train and three (4495 - 4497); intended to haul the new 'West Riding Limited' received names with 'golden' in the title, these being connected to the wool trade: Golden Fleece and Golden Shuttle, although Golden Plover's link was a little more tenuous.

A4 No.4498 was the hundredth Gresley pacific to be built and someone had the idea of naming it after the designer himself, which was a nice gesture. Unfortunately however this did start a rash of renamings of other A4s, usually of directors of the LNER and many of the more obscure bird names (and a few of the better ones: Kestrel, Osprey for example) were exchanged for somewhat less inspiring names.

Just a quick addition

Osprey never carried the name in service. Although the name was allocated to LNER engine 4488/BR 60009 it never made it onto the engine. She carried the plates into the paint shop after construction and came out as Union Of South Africa for the new Coronation service to run alongside the 4 other Dominions/Colonies. 60009 re-entered service in the late 80's it was decided for political reasons not to use the name she ran with for her working life and use the planned name - Osprey, though now she runs as UoSA. Osprey was carried in service by an A1.

The practice of naming was very flexibe and the LNER were never ones to let anything as silly as a plan get in the way of an idea.

For a really good online guide go to http://www.gresley.org.uk/a4names.htm

John

[dilbert]

Try these also.....
Lots of info, many pictures.
http://www.lner.info/
http://www.lner.info/locos/A/a4.shtml

My fave has to be the V4 though!