R J Blenkinsop Author Sunday afternoons in the early 1960s often found me cycling past Wormwood Scrubs to the Grand Union Canal and Old Oak Common. Slipping through the canal side fencing, the roundhouse was invariably full of ‘Kings’, ‘Castles’, ‘Halls’, ‘Modified Halls’, ‘Counties’, ‘4700s’, pannier tanks, Prairie tanks, BR Standard ‘9Fs’, and Stanier ‘8Fs’, with No 48431 carrying an 81A shedplate a seemingly permanent resident. At the time I not only collected names and numbers but also the numbers stamped on the coupling and connecting rods, and the details of any works plates. No 48431 had plates that said ‘LMS BUILT 1944 G.W.R.’ which made me scratch my head and wonder about their provenance. It was only after a visit to the Public Relations Department at Paddington that all…