Welcome to Railways Staff Registers Online
Cheshire and Chester Archives holds 17
staff registers of 4 former railway companies:
- Cambrian Railway
- Great Western Railway
- London and North Western Railway
- London and North Western and Great Western Joint Railway
The registers cover staff working over
a large area of the North West including western Cheshire,
Shropshire, Herefordshire and nine counties in North and mid Wales.
They do not include stations in the east of Cheshire, although the
Crewe works registers are now available on microfilm at the
Cheshire Record Office and can be viewed there. Over the
course of the next 3 years the Crewe works records will
be inputted into a database and, once complete,
added to this website. Advice on the location of railway
staff records can be found on the
National Archives' website.
The registers provide a summary of an
employee’s career, the actual details varying slightly between
registers. The registers cover the period c. 1869 when the first
register was compiled, to c 1950 although no one company’s
registers cover this whole period.
Job grades included are administrative
and station-operating staff - superintendents, clerks, agents,
station masters, porters, ticket examiners, left-luggage office
staff and signalmen. Seamen working on the river Mersey at
Birkenhead as masters, mates and firemen and women working mainly
as waiting room attendants, gatekeepers and cleaners are
included.
Engine drivers and stokers (firemen)
belonged to different departments and are not included in these
registers.
The index contains around 25,000
entries.
It contains these fields:
- Employee’s name - This is entered as Smith,
John
- Location - Usually the station
- Job Grade
- Date of appointment - This date is usually the
start of service, not necessarily the date of promotion.
- Volume - The reference number of the volume
containing the information
- Page
There is usually more information in
the register and copies can be made on the
copy ordering page. Please quote the volume number and page and
include your payment with any order.
If you have any comments or queries
please use our feedback
form.
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use the Railways
Help Section.
Queries
For queries regarding the service, please contact Record Office.