File:506 at Ropley - 51154650842.jpg

English: LSWR Urie S15 Class 4-6-0 No.506 (LSWR No.506, SR No.E506, then 506, BR (SR) No.30506) in SR Bullied 1941 unlined black livery with ‘Sunshine’ lettering and numerals at Ropley during the Mid Hants Railway Spring Steam Gala, 30 April 2021.

No.506 was built by the LSWR at Eastleigh in 1920 and withdrawn by BR (SR) in 1964 after a long life on demanding work.

In my opinion Robert Urie is one of Britain’s under-appreciated locomotive engineers of his era. Whilst not in the same league as Churchward or Gresley, he was, in my opinion, amongst the best of the rest with engineers such as Maunsell, who became Chief Mechanical Engineer of the Southern Railway at the 1923 Grouping rather than Urie, who chose retirement.

When Urie succeeded Dugald Drummond as CME of the LSWR in 1912, the locomotive situation of that railway was in dire straits. Drummond had produced many fine 4-4-0 designs for the North British, Caledonian and LSW Railways but, like so many of his late Victorian/Edwardian contemporaries, was unable to replicate that success when the need for large, modern, efficient 4-6-0’s arose. In fact, his many - very complex - 4-6-0 designs for the LSWR were abysmal failures and Urie had to address the need to produce better engines urgently.

Unfortunately, WWI delayed the production of new designs. Nonetheless, he did produce three classes of successful 4-6-0 before grouping – the H15 mixed traffic, the S15 fast freight and the N15 express passenger classes, some of which were notionally rebuilt from withdrawn Drummond engines. These three classes, with many components in common, got the LSWR traffic department back on an even keel. So successful were they that Maunsell continued to produce them though with his improvements.

The S15’s epitomised Urie’s philosophy of rugged simplicity, being easily maintained with everything ‘get-atable’ (a huge contrast to Drummond’s 4-6-0’s). They had large, free-steaming boilers and could be relied upon even under the difficult circumstances of WWI and WWII. Although intended for fast freight, the S15’s proved entirely capable of filling in for failures on express passenger services and in Summer frequently handled ‘extras’ and excursion traffic. It is notable that when the S15’s and H15’s were receiving their last general overhauls in the late 1950’s/early 1960’s, their robust main frames were exhibiting very few signs of wear after 40 years or more hard service!