Southern Railway

The Southern Railway, often called just the Southern, was a major British transport operator born from the 1923 Grouping. It connected London to the Channel ports, the South West, and popular coastal resorts in Kent and Sussex. This network emerged by merging smaller lines, most notably the London and South Western Railway, the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway, and the South Eastern and Chatham Railway. Its roots stretch back to 1838 when the London and Southampton Railway first opened its tracks. Under the leadership of Sir Herbert Walker, the company mastered public relations and maintained a tight management structure. Spanning 2,186 miles, it remained the smallest of the Big Four railway groups and operated exclusively within England. Unlike its rivals that relied heavily on freight, the Southern made most of its money moving passengers. The organization built the world's largest electrified rail system at the time. Chief Mechanical Engineers Richard Maunsell and later Oliver Bulleid designed new locomotives and carriages to replace older inherited stock. The railway played a critical role during World War II by transporting the British Expeditionary Force to Dunkirk and supplying forces for Operation Overlord in 1944. Famous services like the Brighton Belle and the Golden Arrow defined an era of travel before nationalization in 1948 turned the entity into the Southern Region of British Railways.[edit]