Author name: Michael Williams

TRAGIC news this week that the Independent and Independent on Sunday are to stop printing. I spent 14 years working for both – first as executive editor of the Indy, and then as deputy editor of the Sindy. The closures are inevitable in a digital world where fewer readers want a printed product, and managements

A READER of ‘The Trains Now Departed’ – Keith Baker – has sent me the following delightful memoir of Laurie Earl – famous driver of the crack Euston to Scotland trains: ‘I have recently read this book, and found it to be most enjoyable, as it related to many times in my past experience. I

IF you get a chance, catch up with my episode of ‘Combat Trains’ on the H2 History Channel tonight. There will undoubtedly be frequent repeats  – it shows on Virgin, Sky and BT .

How Britain’s railways won the war. I’m helping narrate the History Channel series Combat Trains this Thursday January 28 at 8.30pm talking about the vital role of the railways on the Home Front. I’d be delighted if you’d join me and watch it http://bit.ly/1JotO3t

  From the group’s latest Winter Bulletin The 2015 AGM  This year’s AGM was held in the Georgian Room in Kendal Town Hall. Filled with an appreciative audience it showed that you don’t have to offer crisis and bad news to tempt peo-ple into a meeting. The formal part of the AGM passed swiftly. Reports

IT WAS the war wound that prevented me getting on with my grandfather. Too late to regret it now but perhaps, a century after he received the blow that crippled him, I can at least attempt to piece together the events around that moment by visiting the place where his life changed for ever. To everyone

GREAT to see the mighty Flying Scotsman back on the rails today after her many tribulations. Let’s hope that the skilled engineers appointed by the National Railway Museum have exorcised what many have long regarded as the “Curse of the Flying Scotsman”. And let’s not forget that great man Sir William McAlpine, whose rescue of

I RECEIVED this letter from a reader of ‘The Trains Now Departed’ at the New Year. It expresses such a lovely sentiment, I thoughtI would share it: Dear Mr Williams, I have just finished reading “The Trains Now Departed” and I think it is the most  enjoyable railway book I have ever read in a

WITH just  a week to go to Christmas, my latest book is No. 2 in the Amazon charts

“A delight it proves to be: 16 compellingly fascinating accounts… together with a delightfully surprising cast of characters, strange tales and maybe even a ghost or two. Stir in the author’s humour and wit, and it makes for a jolly good read” – a nice review of my latest book The Trains Now Departed from

Delighted that my book ‘The Trains Now Departed’ has just been named as one of the ‘Books of the Year’ in the influential ‘Tablet’ magazine http://amzn.to/1xKrjzz

By Michael Williams (From the Sunday Telegraph, December 6 2015) It’s hell out there on the Ypres frontline. Crowds file off tourist buses marked Passchendaele and Tyne Cot, shops are touting maps, medals and memorabilia and the Flanders Fields museum is handing out digital history packages on plastic Fitbit-style wristbands. Only halfway though four years

WATCH me in a new History Channel series starting this week about railways and warfare, called Combat Trains. It’s on Sky and Virgin among other channels. I’ve done some thrilling stuff on World War II, based on my book ‘Steaming to Victory: How Britain’s Railways Won the War’. Here are some pictures of me filming

The inside story of the making of David Lean’s masterpiece, 70 years old this month, from Chapter 14 of ‘Steaming to Victory’ “YOU KNOW– David Lean chose me personally for my part in Brief Encounter. He said, “That’s the girl I want to play the part of Beryl. She was the woman behind the counter

NICE to see my published views on the value of reopening old rail routes quoted in this new report from the influential Bow Group http://www.bowgroup.org/policy/revive-britains-railways-improve-capacity-says-bow-group

Listen to me here: http://ab.co/1KMRNJH http://ab.co/1KMRNJH

WHAT is the best railway carriage view in the world? I was asked this weekend to write up my choice for Telegraph Travel. Spoilt for choice, here’s my selection. The UK really does have some special railway views. Aside from my No. 1, I could have nominated the North Sea from Virgin East Coast at

MY ARTICLE from today’s Daily Mail: IT WAS known as God’s Wonderful Railway – and with good reason. In its glory days, until the drab hand of nationalisation fell on it in 1948, the old Great Western Railway was the most admired railway in the world. It’s carriages were the most comfortable, its engines the

SURELY the railways were better in the good old days. Weren’t they? All the talk about rail renationalisation under new Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn somehow implies it was better in the past when British Rail was in charge. I’ve certainly argued in my new book The Trains Now Departed that there are many things wrong

How lovely. The story from the Independent on Sunday of my recent journey through the Scottish Borders – travelling along the new Borders Railway. http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/uk/scottish-borders-railway-brings-a-historic-region-back-into-focus-10499752.html

NOT OFTEN in a lifetime do you get ahead of the Queen! But as Her Majesty opens Scotland’s new Borders Railway today – the longest domestic main line to be built in Britain for more than a century – I was lucky to get one of the 100 tickets  to board the very first train

THIS week I’m privileged to be among the passengers on Britain’s first new domestic main line for a century – rolling through the delightful scenery of the Scottish Borders. I’ve written the story of the line in my new book The Trains Now Departed: Sixteen excursions into the lost delights of Britain’s railways http://bit.ly/1r1FrBy. It’s a

  THE CARRIAGES are shabby and have seen better days – and the service is sparse, with just five trains each way over its 75-mile length. Some of the stations have primitive facilities, with barely enough shelter to shield passengers from the cutting winds that blast down from the Pennine hills. Yet I’m thinking this

At last achieved my ambition of getting access to the spooky Down Street station on the Piccadilly Line, which I wrote about in my book Steaming to Victory. Here are some of my pix. Full of memories of Churchill – though I didn’t hear the legendary ghostly laughter from the tunnel. This is an extract

A LOVELY evening yesterday talking to local book enthusiasts in Camden about my new title The Trains Now Departed – and the prospects for HS2. It was a fun evening – and thanks to all who came along. Thanks, too, to our local bookshop, The Owl, in Kentish Town Road for hosting. Local bookshops are

A SUPER review of ‘The Trains Now Departed’ by Russ Rollings in the National Railway Museum Review. He writes: The fascinating stories are very readable, peppered with anecdotes and obscure facts. As with Michael Williams’ previous book Steaming to Victory, he has done extensive and meticulous research. Once started it was difficult to to put

WHY we need to save the statue of Sir Nigel Gresley and his Mallard at King’s Cross station. My quote in this week’s Camden New Journal @gresleyduck

I’D BE VERY pleased to see you at my talk at the Owl Bookshop – one of London’s most charming independent bookshops – on ‘The Delights of Britain’s Railways’, based on my bestselling new book ‘The Trains Now Departed: Sixteen Excursions into the Lost Delights of Britain’s Railways’, published by Penguin Random House. There may