When William Stanier arrived at Crewe as LMS chief mechanical engineer in 1932, lie realised that if the West Coast Main Line was to remain competitive with the Anglo-Scottish route of its rival, the LNER, it too required a fleet of Pacifies powerful enough to haul 500-ton express trains of up to 16 coaches unaided on the 401 -mile London-Glasgow route. Thus was born in 1933 the ‘Princess Royal’ class – long, sleek locomotives owing much to Stamer’s Swindon pedigree.

No. 6201 Princess Elizabeth was built at Crewe Works that year as the second in a class of 13 and has become the most famous member of the fleet thanks to an astonishing run it made in November 1936 when it broke virtually every record ever set on the WCML. This it did by running the 401 miles from London to Glasgow in 5hr 53min at an average of just under 70mph – and then back again the next day even faster, in 5hrs 44min! More than 800 miles in total at an average speed of almost 70mph with an average load of 240 tons.

Those two runs established a new world record for the longest and fastest non-stop steam locomotive journey at the time, attracted huge national media coverage and earned driver Tom Clark an OBE.

‘Lizzie’, as she is affectionately known, became one of the LMS’s ‘pet engines’ and appeared in much publicity material – including a photo at Edge Hill shed in 1937, in which a Hornby O-gauge model of No. 6201 was shown by two schoolboys to driver Clark and his fireman. That photo became an all-rime classic and helped cement ‘Lizzie’ into the consciousness of tens of thousands of schoolboys even before locospotting had become a national pastime.

So famous was she that the entire class became known by railwaymen and enthusiasts as ‘Lizzies’ rather than by the official class name of ‘Princess Royals’ (die name of No. 6200).

After a wonderful career pounding the length of the WCML for the LMS and BR, No. 6201 was withdrawn in October 1962 and was bought the following February by the Princess Elizabeth Preservation Fund for F2,160. For that price, BR even delivered it to the group’s base at Ashchurch, Gloucs. That remained the loco’s HQ until it moved to Bulmers Railway Centre at Hereford in 1976. In the caring hands of its owners, it spent 17 years at Hereford, in which rime it worked many main line steam specials, including several in the North-West. When Bulmers closed in 1993, the Locomotive 6201 Princess Elizabeth Society moved the Pacific to the East Lanes Railway, which remains its base when it’s not on railtours.