Stockton & Darlington Railway 0-4-0 No. 1 'Locomotion'
Shildon, Durham, UK 		Location: Locomotion Museum
Status: Display
Posted: May 23, 2025 @ 13:05:06 by Russell Newman
The locomotive that started it all 200 years, the original "Locomotion No. 1" of the Stockton & Darlington Railway, will be the centrepiece, on display with many other locomotives from around the UK at the Greatest Gathering at Litchurch Lane works in Derby as part of the Railway 200 celebrations from the 1st to 3rd of August 2025. To mark 200 years of opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway and 200 years of the modern railway we all know and use today.
Posted: Feb 24, 2025 @ 06:02:47 by Russell Newman
As part of the Railway 200 celebrations the original "Locomotion No. 1" of the Stockton & Darlington Railway will be returing to Darlington and going on loan to Hopetown for a special display along with the replica "Penydarren" locomotive and replica "Steam Elephant", which will run from the Friday the 4th of April to Sunday 22nd of June 2025.
Posted: Mar 11, 2021 @ 09:03:23 by Russell Newman
"Locomotion No. 1" has arrived at Locomotion - National Railway Museum at Shildon in Durham where it will be on display there.
Posted: Mar 8, 2021 @ 06:03:17 by Russell Newman
After being in Darlington for 163 years on display "Locomotion No. 1" of the Stockton & Darlington Railway of 1825 has left the Head of Steam Museum in Darlington and has been relocated to Locomotion Museum at Shildon in Durham for display there. But will return to Darlington again in 2025.
Posted: Mar 6, 2021 @ 06:03:35 by Russell Newman
"Locomotion No. 1" of the Stockton & Darlington Railway of 1825 has been in the news lately as its been at the centre of a row between two railway museums over its future home which has now has been resolved. For most of the past 163 years "Locomotion No 1", the first locomotive to pull a passenger train on a public railway, has been in Darlington which is the birth place of the railways. But its owners the National Railway Museum (NRM) wanted to move it nine miles to Shildon, which was opposed by the council-run Head of Steam Museum. But however a deal has been struck for the two sites "to share" the engine. Almost 7,000 people petition signed a petition for "Locomotion 1" to stay on display in Darlington. The Head of Steam Museum has had the engine under a loan agreement from the NRM which was due to end this month. The NRM, part of the Science Museum Group, intended to move the engine to the Locomotion museum in Shildon to form the centrepiece of a multimillion-pound redevelopment to mark 200 years since the first trip on the Stockton and Darlington Railway on 27 September 1825. The new agreement means the engine will move to Shildon in the coming weeks, but return to Darlington in 2025 for six months. It will go back to the town again for a year sometime between 2026 and 2030. Its sad that the locomotive is leaving Darlington but it remains part of the towns history, and will rightly remain proud of the part Darlington which has played and continues to play in the story of the railways. "Locomotion No. 1" was saved from being scrapped in 1857 by the Pease family of Darlington and aside from a handful of celebratory events and exhibitions has been in the town ever since.
Posted: May 1, 2003 @ 13:05:56 by Steve Frost

This is a most significant survivor of the earliest days of rail transport. Arguably, the Stockton and Darlington Railway was the first proper public, steam hauled railway in the world, and Locomotion hauled the inauguaral train in 1825. It is a technological blind alley with vertical cylinders mounted in a simple single flue boiler, and all that complex Fremantle valve gear atop the boiler. These locos were rather unreliable and slow, but they did work for a time. By 1829, 'Rocket' set the standard for all future types and the rest is history.

Locomotion survived as in use a colliery pumping engine, but was rescued and took part in the 50th anniversary of the S&DR, after which it was displayed at North Road station in Darlington. In 1925 it took part in the procession to mark 100 years of the S&DR (powered by a car engine in the tender), after which it was displayed at Darlington's main station, Bank Top, for a further 50 years. In 1975, it was removed for display at the North Road Station Museum, where it is to this day.

How much of it is original is uncertain. It certainly suffered at least one boiler explosion, and broke its cast iron wheels quite often. Today it has 3 wheels to one design and the fourth is of a different pattern! Who cares? We are pleased to have such an important loco from the dawn of the railway.

Posted: May 1, 2003 @ 13:05:34 by Steve Frost