No famous locomotive family owes its origin to stranger or more dramatic circumstances. Amalgamations of large and long established business houses are seldom consummated without deep undercurrents, outbursts of partisan feeling and much frustration; but on the LMS interdepartmental strife led to the complete overturning of the policy of a distinguished Chief Mechanical Engineer, and the imposition of panic measures to get large numbers of an entirely different design built quickly. How these engines, the Royal Scots of 1927, were developed, with little modification, into a great locomotive forms a stirring tale. In this book O.S. Nock describes these early stages, and how the great experience of Sir William Stanier brought the design to its highest achievement. How the smaller version, the Baby Scots, known as Patriots, came out of the enlarged boiler LNWR Claughton continues the story; finally came the conversion of all the Royal Scots and many of the Baby Scots into the taper boilered variety, which despite much outstanding work were not without their troubles. Mr Nock's account is drawn from first hand observation and frequent travel over long periods, together with experience on the footplate. The book contains many photographs and diagrams.