The great age of the railways may be long past, but mementos live on in the shape of railwayana — objects used on the railways, such as hand lamps and level-crossing signs.

The most sought-after of these objects is coming up for sale next month, when a collection of brass locomotive nameplates goes under the hammer at the Spring Transport Sale at the Bristol saleroom of Dreweatt Neate, the auction house, on April 17. Details of the sale can be found at www.the-saleroom.com — a website run by the Antiques Trade Gazette— where people can bid online.

Peter Rixon, head of the collectors’ department at Dreweatt Neate, says: “Railwayana is separated into three periods. In the period until 1923 lots of little railways crossed the country, some merely a single line joining two places. Between 1923 and 1947 the four great railway companies existed: the Great Western Railway (GWR), the Southern Railway (SR), the London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMSR) and the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER). The third period is from 1947, when the railways were nationalised, to the present.”

There is a market for modern railwayana, but the most sought-after items are those from before 1923. Just about everything that was connected with trains is collectible, and not just by railway enthusiasts. For example, railway posters, which were often designed by famous artists, are popular with train buffs and poster collectors. Even door handles garner interest because the big four companies would stamp them with their initials.

Collecting railwayana need not be an expensive hobby. “The vast majority of railwayana costs less than £100,” Mr Rixon says. And even when prices rise above that, the sums are not normally huge. A good example in the forthcoming sale is a sign for a station that served two villages in Berkshire. It is titled “Cholsey and Moulsford”, probably dates from the 1930s and has an estimate of £150 to £200.

Also in the sale is an LNER timekeeping clock. Mr Rixon thinks that it comes from a locomotive repair shed and probably dates from between 1925 and 1935. The clock has an estimate of £200 to £300.

However, serious money is involved when it comes to brass locomotive nameplates. “These are rare,” Mr Rixon says. “All locomotives operated by a particular company had numbers, but only the more prestigious had names. There would be two nameplates, on either side of the carriage, as well as a plate with a cab door number and a plate with a number that went on the smoke box at the front. It is rare to find a complete set of nameplates and cab door and smoke box number plates — and they are very expensive.”

Indeed, they were expensive from the start. Nameplates became collectible in the early 1960s, as the era of steam ended and the trains were scrapped. British Rail, which by then ran the railways, realised that it had a commercial opportunity on its hands and began selling off the plates for about £15. The person who owned the plates coming up in the Dreweatt Neate sale was a railway worker who bought his three nameplates for £20 and then kept them under the bed. It proved a canny investment: the record price achieved by a locomotive nameplate is more than £60,000.

The three nameplates in next month’s sale all come from the Great Western Railway and adorned trains that were built in Swindon. The oldest is Saint Benedict, built in 1907, while the other two, Dunraven Castle and Aberystwyth Castle, both date from 1925.

The lowest estimate, at £12,000 to £15,000, is for Saint Benedict because the locomotive was less prestigious than the other two and the plate not in such good condition. Dunraven Castle is estimated at £15,000 to £20,000, while Aberystwyth Castle could fetch up to £25,000 because it also includes the cab door number.

Dreweatt Neate: 0117 9737201

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