On the 9th of June 1865, Charles Dickens was travelling aboard the Folkestone to London Boat Train with his mistress and her mother, when it derailed while crossing a viaduct near Staplehurst in Kent. The train plunged down a bank into a dry river bed, killing ten passengers, and badly wounding forty. Dickens was profoundly affected by the disaster, and a year later, he published The Signalman, a supremely atmospheric ghost story in which the narrator, while investigating a dank and lonely railway cutting, meets the signalman who lives there. His new acquaintance appears to live under the...

This essential guide opens up the treasures of London's most alluring quarter. At its core are Westminster Abbey, Parliament, and the palatial Government buildings of Whitehall, together with the great band of Royal Parks stretching westward toward Kensington. It also includes London's West End (Covent Garden, Soho, Mayfair, and St. James's) and the less well-known Belgravia and Pimlico.

For each area there is a detailed gazetteer and brief introduction. A general introduction provides a historical and artistic overview. Numerous maps and plans, over 100 new color photographs, full...

St Pancras is an iconic London landmark of Gothic dream palace & futuristic train shed - built in the 1860s for the new Midland Railway line into London. Over the years, the station has flourished, but has also come close to being demolished. This book examines this story of changes in taste & of the understanding of the past.