London and South Western Railway Luggage Labels
Coloured Labels -Type 1 |
| by Mike Morant
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| With just a couple of notable exceptions, all LSWR labels are basically the same shape with some slight differences in proportions. The coloured labels are subdivided into four categories which are distinguished by the different formats of the company title. The earliest type, referred to amongst collectors as L91/1 but as Column (or Type) 1 in the RPS guide, has a very neat appearance compared with its successors. |
| Note the uniformity of the railway title which was
never improved upon in the later styles and is the only label heading style
that utilises the full company name. The heading never varies on this type of
label which is far from the case with the later types.
The '787' code was on (nearly) all LSWR labels from the beginning of label production and this type is constant in that respect. It should always be on the right side and enclosed in brackets on this type but many examples are missing one or both brackets. The destination of Colyton helps us to narrow down the production date as it was opened in 1860 and renamed Seaton Junction in 1868/9. The destination of Arundel is one of the few labels to be printed on what is termed 'orange' paper but which actually varies between buff and a fairly strong orange. With a single exception LBSCR coastal destinations are the only ones which were printed on this paper. |
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The font used for this earliest type is
fairly consistent across the surviving examples but is vastly different between
lower and upper case examples and there can be a variant within the latter. The
bulk of the destinations is followed by a somewhat heavy rendering of a full
stop. That would be natural in this example as it's an abbreviation and
what a strange one that is!
The example to DEAN illustrates the totally different font that was applied to, seemingly, only this destination. It also differs in having a round instead of a square full stop. The differences don’t end there as the paper is of a better quality than other examples within this genre and the hue, difficult to illustrate clearly, is nearer turquoise than blue. |
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| It has been mentioned on the previous page that grey paper was used for only four destinations and there seems to have been little point in route-coding Overton, Whitchurch, Grately and Porton whilst applying a different colour (blue) to Andover which is plumb in the middle of them! It is only on this earliest type that grey is to be found and those stations became part of the 'blue' route thenceforth. As grey was used but subsequently abandoned then this type is the only one that makes use of the full range of colours. |
All photographs are copyright
Type 1 | Type 2 | Type 3 | Type 4 | Type 5
This page was last updated 7 July 2007
