Our business is selling books of quality on all aspects of railways, historical and technical. We need a constant supply of fresh material to satisfy this demand.

We are always interested in buying institutional libraries in whole or part. Past purchases in this category include the Derby Railway Research Library, the British Transport Commission Central Reference Library, the Institute of Transport Library and most recently the duplicate stock of the Halton Borough Transport Reference Library.

We have nearly thirty years experience of dealing sympathetically and efficiently with private book collections from deceased estates.

Arrangements can be made for viewing, pricing and transport to fit in with the requirements of executors. Where a collection needs urgent removal for reasons of security or an imminent property sale it can be brought to Stamford for storage and sorting.

The purchase of 'thinnings' from current collections occurs daily. Small quantities can be dealt with over the counter. If you have more than a box or two, or require an instant decision, a few days' warning is helpful. We can often collect larger quantities from most parts of the country.

Examples of the types of material we require:

Antiquarian works of many kinds and fine leather or cloth bindings.
Company and area histories, especially standard reference books and sets.
Historical and technical works on steam, diesel and electric locomotion, test bulletins, workshop manuals, builders' catalogues.
Technical works on rolling stock, signalling, railway construction and train operation.
Railway economics, policy, law and finance.
Biographies and autobiographies.
Books on overseas railways in most languages.
Atlases, Railway Clearing House and Airey maps and similar folded and card maps.
Public and working timetables before 1965, and related official instructions. Foreign timetables.
Railway official publications, publicity and guide books.
Gazetteers, yearbooks, shareholders' manuals, statistical returns, government and parliamentary reports.
Bound runs of periodicals (especially Railway Magazine and The Locomotive) including the research societies and the proceedings of professional and technical bodies (eg Civil Engineers, Mechanical Engineers, ILE and IRSE).
Light railways, narrow gauge and industrial railways.
Unusual items of all kinds including privately published books, manuscripts.

Please contact us if you have a collection to sell.

If you would like to send us a list attached to an e-mail please use a text (.txt) or rich text (.rtf) format only. Our software cannot open other formats, not even MS Word files.

A few categories we don't want:

Mass-market gift books of the "Great Trains Of The World" type.
Cheap paperback reprints
Minor literature: preservation guides and stock lists, open day brochures, rail tour keepsakes, track bed walking guides.
Random accumulations of unbound magazines.
Timetables later than 1965.

We do not deal in railwayana hardware, models, badges, tickets or videos.