CR 123 Exhibition Single Class
Design and development
Neilson & Co., Glasgow's leading locomotive builder, built CR 123 in 1886 as their exhibit at the International Exhibition held in Edinburgh that year. It was a 4-2-2 single-driver with 7 ft drivers, leading bogie, inside cylinders, parallel boiler — a representative late-Victorian express engine. After the exhibition the Caledonian Railway purchased the engine and put it into normal service.
Service and withdrawals
CR 123 worked Caledonian expresses from 1886, including the famous 1888 "Race to Edinburgh" between the East Coast and West Coast routes, when 123 hauled the West Coast train from Carlisle to Edinburgh on its record-setting run. The engine continued in service through the LMS years and was finally withdrawn in 1935. It was retained by the LMS as a heritage piece, restored to CR blue, and ran on special occasions through the BR period. Now preserved at the Riverside Museum, Glasgow in static display.
Identification features
4-2-2 with 7 ft single driving wheel, leading 4-wheel bogie, inside cylinders, parallel boiler with brass dome, polished brass safety-valve casing. Distinctive Caledonian Prussian blue livery with extensive lining.
Notable locomotives
- 123 (1886, Riverside Museum, Glasgow)