The royal family have enjoyed rail travel since the day Queen Victoria made her first trip in a specially made carriage from Slough to London Paddington.
The Great Western Railway company built the carriage in anticipation of Victoria’s patronage and two years later she did, but only after being persuaded on board by Prince Albert, a veteran of rail travel fascinated by the new technology.
She appeared a fan and wrote in her diary about the journey on June 13 1842: “It took us exactly 30 minutes going to Paddington, & the motion was very slight, & much easier than the carriage, also no dust or great heat, in fact, it was delightful and so quick.”
To mark the 175th anniversary of the trip, Queen Elizabeth II and the late Duke of Edinburgh recreated the journey in 2017.
Victoria later commissioned a special pair of coaches built by the London & North Western Railway in 1869 and so began a succession of royal trains with her son King Edward VII, later ordering a royal train designed to be “as much like the Royal Yacht as possible”.
The royal family keep up with modern innovations and Victoria’s grandson King George V installed one of the first baths on a train during the First World War as he toured the UK to boost morale.
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No special royal locomotive exists but the royal train is pulled by standard engines and throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries all major railway companies within the British Isles maintained dedicated royal carriages.
To mark Elizabeth’s Silver Jubilee in 1977 British Rail provided a new royal train that featured a Queen’s saloon or carriage with a bedroom, sitting room and bathroom and a separate bedroom and bathroom for her dresser, while Philip’s carriage was a similar design but included a kitchen.
In the mid 1980s the fleet was updated and new carriages were added including one used by the King, then the prince of Wales, and now the train has nine carriages, seven royal and two support.
