Highland Railway

The Highland Railway was one of the two smallest of the five major Scottish railway companies before the 1923 Grouping, formed in 1865 through the merger of two existing railways centered on Inverness. Based in Inverness, its network extended north of Perth to serve the farthest reaches of Britain, eventually covering Caithness, Sutherland, Ross and Cromarty, Inverness, Perth, Nairn, Moray and Banff, carrying both passengers and freight to destinations including Wick, Thurso and Kyle of Lochalsh. During the First World War it ran the Jellicoe Express between London and Thurso to serve the Royal Navy base at Scapa Flow, and in 1923 it was absorbed into the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, transferring about 494 miles of track.