When it was taken out of service in 1963 it was bought by Alan Pegler a businessman from Nottingham for the sum of £3,000. He completely restored and in 1969 took it on a tour of the USA driving the engine himself.

In 1973 it was bought by the builder Sir William McAlpine, but after Sir William and pop impressario Pete Waterman ran into financial difficulties it was left to decay in a shed. It was finally purchased by Dr Tony Marchant from Oxfordshire in 1996 for the sum of £1.5m. Restoration began in a former Great Western Railway shed in West London. Experts were enlisted to help in the most expensive restoration ever including Roland Kennington, locomotives Chief Engineer from the 1980's and ex-British Railway man David Ward.

The restoration took three years to complete at a cost of £1m and the 76 year old express made it's first run after restoration on the 4th July 1999. It travelled from Kings Cross to York, tickets for the trip for enthusiasts cost £350 each.

The Scotsman passed through Lidlington station in the early hours on the morning of 30th of March 1974 when it visited Bletchley for viewing. It stood on the flyover still fired up until it was taken down to Fenny Sidings at 4am on the Saturday. It was crewed by driver George Pierce and fireman Charlie Wyn-De-Bank for all day viewing. It also visited Bletchley again on the 7th October 1999. I briefly met one of the part-time firemen who crewed the Scotsman between 1954-56 who now lives in Dunstable, alas I have not been able to interview him yet.

First non-stop London to Edinburgh run on the 1st May 1928 completed 393 miles in eight and a quarter hours.The long journey was too much for a single footplate crew to work so the engineer H.N.Gresley designed a corridor tender with a gangway connection, that gave access to the leading coach. The second crew travelled in the reserved compartment at the front of the train and they gained access to the footplate through a cramped corridor down the right hand side of the tender, to take their turn on the footplate. The crew change was done just north of York,the second crew then took it on to Edinburgh.

*It can haul 600 tons and uses 45lb of coal and 40 gallons of water every mile.

*In Australia in 1989 it set a world non stop steam record of 422 miles in 9 hours & 25 minutes.

*And as already quoted from Leeds to London the first locomotive to attain a speed of 100 mph.

Talking to a friend of mine Dez Ballard who was on the railways for 25 years at Bletchley, he was telling me that visits of the royal trains were covered by a strict routine, for example there was always a stand by Black five engine which had all the coal changed to top quality. also there was a policeman on duty on all the bridges on the route, and there was a footplate inspector on the footplate for the whole of the route, several visits to Bletchley including one by Queen Victoria.