Palaces on wheels: Royal carriages at the National Railway Museum

Rear cover notes: "From almost the earliest days of the fully mechanised railway, members of the British Royal Family have been inveterate train travellers - none more so than Queen Victoria. However, it was for her aunt, the Dowager Queen Adelaide, widow of William IV, that the first genuine royal saloon was provided. The preservation of this vehicle began a process, uninterrupted until the present day, that has conserved the principal railway saloons of all subsequent British monarchs and their families. It has resulted in the British National Railway Museum at York becoming the custodian of the largest, finest and most varied collection of royal railway vehicles anywhere in the world. Between Queen Adelaide's saloon and the 'modern' saloons of 1941 stand some ten other preserved vehicles of royal status or with royal associations, spanning a century of progress, development and social change. Palaces on Wheels tells their story."