David Wragg

A historical dictionary of the railways of the British Isles. Barnsley: Wharncliffe, 2009. 288pp..

This book suffers from several defects, some of which stem from its use of the term "dictionary" and which might be overlooked had the term "handbook" or even "encyclopaedia" been used. One expects a dictionary to be in alphabetical order with precise, concise definitions, but the entries are long and many topics are subsumed into broad categories which are not mutually exclusive. Thus there is no heading for Pullman, nor is there one for Bournemouth Belle, yet both topics are mentioned in a non-lexical heading "Naming of trains". Furthermore, there is another entry at "High speed trains" which includes a mention of Silver Jubilee [train] and Mallard [locomotive]: neither of which are featured in the main alphabetical sequence.
The entries contain far too many words, many of which add nothing to the information: more than, nearby, wide and varied, and so on. Many are excessively long in relation to their overall importance: half a column on Mansell [as in wheel] and a full column on the Manx Electric Railway. It may seem to be a harsh judgement, but wait until the omissions are noted: neither Peppercorn nor Thompson are included yet the broadly comparable Hawksworth is. Hawkshaw, Garratt and Beyer were sought in vain.
Accuracy seems to be fairly good, yet there is some evidence of sloppiness. In the entry for the East Kent Railway it is alleged that it was "almost immediately closed" under British Railways and there is no mention of the Kent Coalfield which kept part of it alive for several years.
The layout of the text is not helpful: there are whole pages where it is not immediately clear what a piece of text relates to (remember the dictionary claim). There is a bibliography which fails to mention Ottley and includes four titles by Nock and an equal number by Wragg.  There is very little evidence that the book was "read" prior to publication or was "edited". There are some illustrations which in the case of the portraits can be justified, but the captions contain some howlers, the most notable being Sir William Stanier standing beside his locomotive No. 10000 – actually Herbert Nigel Gresley. Neither engineer had been knighted in 1930. Bulleid "left after nationalisation, angered by the rebuilding of his locomotives": both statements are true, but were not connected. Two pictures of double-deck trains are visually interesting, but they have yet to make a significant contribution to British transport.
Orher serious errors noted included Selby on the route of the Settle & Carlsle line.
Nevertheless, there is good entry on Geddes (and he quotes the 'Geddes Axe').
Wartime on the railways. Stroud (Gloucs): Sutton, 2006. 200pp.
Not well organised; mainly WW2. Bibliography fails to note Pratt's magisterial study of WW1 (AWOL Norwich & Norfolk) and It can now be revealed..