the tender. During the Second World War, the class was painted wartime black livery with Bulleid's "Sunshine Yellow" lettering. The U1s were initially numbered in the Southern Railway's post-grouping series from A890–A900 for the first eleven constructed. The letter "A" reflected the post-grouping practice of the Southern Railway to denote the engine's place of origin within the pre-grouping (SECR in this case) number. This helped to prevent confusion with locomotives of similar numbers that the Southern Railway acquired from other pre-grouping companies. The "A" in this case denotes Ashford works. This was changed to the series 1890–1910 during the 1930s, when the final members of the class were constructed. British Railways The class was absorbed by British Railways in 1948, and were given the British Railways Power classification 4P3F. Livery was initially similar to the Southern Railway, though with "British Railways" on the tender, and an 'S' prefix to the Southern number. This was succeeded by the British Railways mixed-traffic lined black livery with red, cream and grey lining and the British Railways crest on the tender. The British Railways standard numbering system was used to replace the Southern Railway system, and the class was allocated the series 31890–31910. References Notes Bibliography Further reading External links Class U-1 Details at Rail UK U1 2-6-0 locomotives Railway locomotives introduced in 1928 Standard gauge steam locomotives of Great Britain Scrapped locomotives Passenger locomotives