This book is the first of two which covers the history of the Great Eastern Railway and its predecessors from the first proposal for a railway in the eastern counties in 1811 for a railway from Islington to Wallasea Island and Mucking to its absorption into the London and North Eastern Railway under the 1923 Grouping of Railways. This volume covers the period from 1811 up to the formation of the Great Eastern Railway in 1862.

The history is the first history of the GER since Cecil J. Allen’s history of the railway which was first published in 1955 and which has long been out of print.

The book makes use of both previously published works on the GER and its predecessors, but also contemporary documents such as the Directors’ reports to shareholders of the Eastern Counties Railway, timetables, reports in local and national newspapers as well as extracts from selected peoples' diaries. Some of which were not easily available to Allen when he wrote his history of the GER. Incorporating these other sources means the book sheds new light on the Railway’s history.

The book is intended for anyone who is either interested in railways and particularly the Great Eastern Railway and the railways of the east of England, but also for anyone who is interested in general in the history of that part of England.

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Ancestry
• Chapter 2: The Eastern Counties and Northern and Eastern Railways to August 1845
• Chapter 3: The Yarmouth and Norwich and Norwich and Brandon Railways to the End of July 1845
• Chapter 4: The Eastern Union Railway to the End of 1846
• Chapter 5: The Eastern Counties Railway from August 1845 to December 1850
• Chapter 6: The East Anglian Railway to the End of 1849
• Chapter 7: The Norfolk Railway and the Eastern Counties Railway to the End of 1850
• Chapter 8: London and Blackwall Railway to the End of 1850
• Chapter 9: The Newmarket and Chesterford Railway
• Chapter 10: The East Anglian Railway from the End of 1849 to the End of 1851
• Chapter 11: The Eastern Union and its Associated Railways from 1847 to 1853
• Chapter 12: The Eastern Counties and Other Railways from 1851 to the Formation of the Great Eastern Railway in 1862
• Appendix: Locomotives, Rolling Stock and Ships of Constituent Companies from 1838 to 1862
• Bibliography and Sources