Ashford railway works was a major locomotive and wagon construction and repair workshop in Ashford, Kent in England. Constructed by the South Eastern Railway in 1847, it became a major centre for railway works in the 19th and early 20th centuries. After years of decline, it closed in 1982.

The SER opened a locomotive depot at Ashford in December 1842, sited to the East of the station adjacent to the works. This was demolished in 1931, when the SR built a much larger facility on the other side of the main line. This was closed to steam locomotives in 1962, but used to service diesels until 1968. Thereafter it was used for the Ashford Steam Centre for a period, but has now been demolished.^[15]

In 1853 the Locomotive Superintendent James I. Cudworth built the first of ten 'Hastings' class 2-4-0 locomotives there. In 1855 these were followed by two freight engines. (An unusual feature of these was a dual firebox, each side fired alternately.) Over the next twenty years, Cudworth built 53 freight locomotives at Ashford and around 80 larger ones with six foot driving wheels, plus the first eight of his sixteen express passenger locos, the 'Mails', with seven foot drivers. He also produced four classes of 0-6-0 tank locomotives.^[1]

In 1878 James Stirling, the brother of Patrick Stirling of the Great Northern Railway took over and introduced a deal of standardisation. He believed in the benefits of the bogie and produced a class of 4-4-0 with six foot drivers and his '0' class freight with five foot drivers. He also produced over a hundred 0-4-4 tank engines, and in 1898 the 4-4-0 'B' Class.^[16]

The first Locomotive, Carriage & Wagon Superintendent for the South Eastern and Chatham Railway was H.S. Wainwright who produced a series of successful and elegant designs at Ashford. Wainwright's tender engines built at Ashford included 0-6-0 freight locomotives of the 'C' class, and the 4-4-0 passenger engines of the 'D' and 'E' classes. His tank engines built at the works included the versatile and long-lived 0-4-4 'H' class, the larger 0-6-4 'J' class and the diminutive 0-6-0 tank engines of the 'P' class. Wainwright was followed by Richard Maunsell, who introduced the ultimately unsuccessful 'K' class 2-6-4 mixed traffic tank locomotives (which were later rebuilt into 2-6-0 tender locomotives), and the useful 'N' class 2-6-0 mixed traffic locomotives in 1917.

However, more of the 'N' class locomotives were produced at the works, and parts for 'K' class locos that were assembled by Armstrong Whitworth of Newcastle upon Tyne.^[16] In 1942 the works also built twenty of the Bulleid 'Q1' class 0-6-0, the remainder being built at Brighton Works.^[17] During the later war years the works also built a number of the LMS 8F type 2-8-0 freight locomotives for the War Department.^[18] The last of the 639 steam locomotives built there^[13] was LMSR 2-8-0 No. 8674.^[9]

In 1937 it was involved with in the English Electric company in the construction of three experimental diesel-electric shunters^[19][20] and after the war, Ashford Works continued manufacturing a further series of 350 hp 0-6-0 diesel-electric shunters.^[21] Under British Railways Ashford Works built the first two of the Southern Region prototype 1Co-Co1 diesel electric locomotives of the D16/2 class numbered 10201 and 10202 in 1951.^[13] In 1962 all locomotive production and repairs were moved to Eastleigh.^[13][9]