5 Bel 3052 about to pass through the platforms at Haywards Heath
Foxley Slide 84 available to purchase from SEG Sales

The Brighton Belle

The Pullman Car Company had its origins in the USA, where George Pullman pioneered the concept of providing luxury restaurant and sleeping cars, with passengers paying a premium over and above the cost of their train ticket.  The Southern Railway's predecessor, the London Brighton and South Coast Railway (LBSCR) had an association with Pullman's UK subsidiary that dated back to 1877 when it signed a contract for the provision of Pullman restaurant cars on its Brighton expresses.  In 1908 the two companies launched the "Southern Belle", a daily all-Pullman express service to Brighton with a brand-new fleet of sumptuous 12-wheel cars.

On its formation in 1923 the Southern Railway took over and renewed the contract between the LBSCR and the Pullman Car Company.  When the Southern Railway electrified its main line to Brighton, Pullman provided restaurant cars for the new express electric multiple units and built a special fleet of three 5-car all-Pullman units to operate the Southern Belle service, which was renamed the "Brighton Belle" in 1934.

As with locomotive hauled and other EMU Pullman cars, the Southern Railway was responsible for operations and for maintaining the underframes, bogies and traction equipment of the 5 Bel units.  The bodies and interior fittings were maintained by Pullman at their Preston Park works just outside Brighton.

The 5 Bel fleet

5 Bel units 2051-2053 (renumbered 3051-3053 at the beginning of 1937) each comprised two motor brake thirds, a trailer third and two trailer kitchen firsts.

The fifteen cars were built in 1932 by the Metropolitan Carriage Wagon and Finance Co. Ltd. (MCWF).  They were of all-steel construction with bodywork based on contemporary Pullman car design, having a large window to each seating bay that incorporated horizontally sliding glazed ventilators and recessed, inwards-opening external passenger doors with deep, oval windows.  Interiors were sumptuous, ornate and very traditional, with elaborate panelling of hardwood from various parts of the Empire and metalwork finished in "satin silver".

Technically the 5 Bel units were similar to, and could operate in multiple with, the 6 Pul., 6 Cit. and 6 Pan fleets.  They were also capable of running in multiple with the Southern's later builds of pre-war express EMUs of the 4 Cor family.

As with the Pul. units, the driving motor brake cars were equipped with Metropolitan-Vickers underfloor-mounted electro-pneumatic traction control switchgear feeding four British Thomson-Houston (BTH) type 163 traction motors mounted on the two 9ft equalising beam bogies and driving the four axles through reduction gears designed for a top speed of 75mph.  They had a full width driving cab and a guard's/luggage compartment with a periscope lookout and seat.  In the absence of a vestibule at the outer end of the passenger saloon the partition between the guard's compartment and the passenger accommodation incorporated an emergency exit door.  Two 3-bay third class saloons ("parlours" in Pullman terminology) had a total of 48 seats arranged 2+2 either side of a central gangway in facing pairs with tables.  At the inner end of the car was a lavatory, vestibule and corridor connection.

The third class parlour trailers seated 56 in a four-bay and a three-bay saloon with a central divider and with a lavatory, vestibule and corridor connection at each end.

The first class kitchen trailers consisted of end vestibules and corridor connections flanking a small all-electric kitchen with a 110V power supply from an underfloor dynamotor, pantry, two 2-bay saloons with seating arranged 1+1 either side of a central gangway, a 4 seat first class compartment and a lavatory compartment.  The tare weight of each car was 43 tons.

The cars followed the Pullman practice of displaying numbers prominently on the bodysides of third class cars and names on first class cars.  As with the Pullman cars formed in the Pul. units and in keeping with the "Belle" theme, popular girls' names of the era were chosen for the first class cars.  The stock numbers ("schedule numbers" in Pullman parlance) for the First-class cars are shown in brackets below.

Original unit formations

In service

The 5 Bel units operated the Brighton Belle service throughout their working lives, either singly or in pairs according to demand.  Occasionally, especially in winter, a 5 Bel unit would be paired with a 6 Pul. or 6 Pan. unit to avoid duplicating the Brighton Belle service and the normal hourly non-stop Brighton service.  Apart from a short-lived Victoria-Eastbourne service in summer 1948 the units did not routinely work on other lines but they were sometimes used for Royal Trains and other VIP special services over other Southern Electric lines.

As a result of operating and staffing pressures during the 1939-45 war, Pullman car and other catering services were withdrawn from 22 May 1942.  After the war, 5 Bel unit 3051 was made up to six cars with "Doris", "Hazel", "Mona" and "Gwen" and ran thus briefly before formal reinstatement of the "Brighton Belle".  3051 returned to traffic in October 1946, 3053 in November 1946, but 3052 did not reappear until September 1947 as one car, motor third No. 90, had been severely war-damaged at Victoria in October 1940.

In 1954 British Rail acquired the Pullman Car Company and with it the 5 Bel fleet.

When BR re-equipped the Brighton main line with new CIG and BIG units in the mid 1960s, the Brighton Belle's regular clientele (which included a considerable number of actors and other celebrities living in Brighton and commuting daily to London) lobbied for the service to be retained.  With their sturdy all-steel construction and relatively low mileages (including wartime storage) the three 5 Bel units were not in fact life expired.  Accordingly they were given an overhaul at Eastleigh during which the stencil headcodes on each unit end were replaced by roller blinds and the traditional umber and cream Pullman livery gave way to BR's new blue and grey corporate house-style.

Somehow, this trendy new image only served to emphasise the units'; age and dated interiors whilst the ride quality of the 5 Bel units did not compare well with the new CIGs.  The loyal clientele was fading away and new customers did not regard the elderly units as a premium product.  Accordingly the last "Brighton Belle" service ran on Sunday 30 April 1972 and the units were withdrawn from service.

However, almost all of these unique cars have survived in one form or another.