The Railways Act of 1921, also known as the Grouping forcibly merged British railway companies into "The Big Four", as of 1st January 1923. The Big four were:

• London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS)
• Great Western Railway (GWR)
• London and North Eastern Railway (LNER)
• Southern Railway (SR)

(details of their constituents can be found by following the links)

History

The British railway system had been built haphazardly by many companies which were strongly competitive with each other. During the 1914-1918 Great War the railways had been under state control which continued until 1921. Nationalisation was considered at the time, but was rejected. (It was subsequently carried out after World War II see Transport Act 1947). It was proposed to merge the railways into five companies, Scottish, Southern, Midland/North Western, Eastern and Western. The Scottish companies were however grouped with the Eastern and Midland/North Western respectively, so that the three main Anglo-Scottish trunk routes, were owned by one company for its full length. The West Coast Main Line the Midland Main Line by the LMS and the East Coast Main Line were entirely owned by the LNER.

External links

• View the text of the Act (http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/docSummary.php?docID=65)
• Some historical opinion articles from the University of York (http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/irs/irshome/features/readings/archive/grouping.htm)