Designed for suburban and local passenger services, 140 of these large ‘Prairies’ were built at Swindon between 1929 and 1949. These locomotives were a development of Churchward’s 1903 ‘31XX/51XX’ Class overseen by GWR Chief Mechanical Engineer, Charles Collett. New to Chester West shed, 5153 entered service in March 1930 and enjoyed a career that lasted almost 35 years. After moving to Newton Abbot in the 1940s, it had a spell at Kidderminster before reaching Leamington in 1964, which was its final shed, withdrawal coming just three months later. It was scrapped in June 1965.