British Railways was created in 1948 when the Great Western, the London, Midland & Scottish, the London & North Eastern and the Southern were taken into public ownership. BR inherited all their locomotives, passenger and goods rolling stock. Whilst much has been published on BR locomotives and passenger stock, accurate and detailed coverage of the large inventory of vehicles used to convey the huge volumes of goods traffic carried by the railways at that time, is less readily available. This series sets out to provide that information. Written by David Larkin, one of the acknowledged experts on British railway wagons, each volume is heavily illustrated throughout.

Starting with an overview of the categories of vehicles covered, this fifth volume explores the huge fleet of open general merchandise wagons, of various sizes, acquired from the 'Big Four'. The wagons are generally dealt with in relation to the companies that built them. The types of wagons covered in this volume includes three-plank mostly dropside opens and the more common general merchandise five-plank versions. It also deals with all the wagons which were produced with shock absorbing equipment from the 1930s onwards, low sided 20-ton capacity all-steel aggregate wagons and PW open wagons used for ballast and general loads.

This series is an essential work of reference for all those interested in BR's huge wagon fleet and a valuable reference tool for railway modellers.