GWR King 4-6-0 No 6017 King Edward IV with the Up 'Mayflower' at Taunton on 27 June 1958. The fireman, with assistance from the driver, are up on the tender moving coal forward for the next leg of the journey.

Peter Kerslake says "This is not a down working but is the 8:30 a.m. from Plymouth to Paddington as Reporting No .605 confirms.
Once of of Laira's finest 6017 looks in need of a bit of care here, but its time at Laira was coming to an end as was the use of "Kings" on the principal expresses between Plymouth and Paddington and 6017 was sent to Wolverhampton just eight months after this view.
Most of Laira's "Kings" ended their days at Old Oak Common, working their final years to Cardiff and to Shrewsbury and 6017 was finally condemned in July of 1962.
6017 received new front main frames and inside cylinder block during its ten weeks spell in Swindon from late September until early December of 1955, the seventh of 14 "Kings" so modified between September of 1954 and August of 1958."


Photo: J.P. Wilson / Rail Archive Stephenson