AS a seat of railway manufacturing, Swindon was second to none. Now, chairs from the glory days of the Great Western Railway will be going under the hammer at a Cirencester auction.

The auction at Moore Allen & Innocent on Friday, May 29, will include memorabilia from the heyday of the Swindon Railway Works.

Three Victorian bar back chairs, two having been reupholstered with British Rail seats, will command an auctioneer’s estimate of £50 to £80, while two Edwardian slat back chairs – one stamped First Aid and accompanied by a metal GWR first aid box – are also expected to achieve £50 to £80.

There is also a collection of Victorian railway hand lamps, some stamped Swindon Works, others carrying a Birmingham Works mark. Among the best are a red and white painted GWR lamp at £150 to £200, and a copper and black lamp at £100 to £150.

From chairs to hares, two mosaics by the artist Joy MacGurk, inspired by Cirencester’s famous 4th century Roman hare mosaic, will be sold with an auctioneer’s estimate of £100 to £150 for the smaller (18ins by 17ins) of the two, and £250 to £350 for the larger, which measures 33ins by 25ins.

Last year Moore Allen & Innocent conducted an auction of 50, 5ft hare statues which raised more than £100,000 for charity.

Finally, a collection of Nepalese postage stamps spanning more than a century is being sold commission-free by the auctioneers on behalf of a the Cotswolds-based charity Nepal Schools Aid, which works to support the development of primary school education in the earthquake-stricken country.

The stamps, the earliest of which date from 1907, and the latest of which celebrate the 50th birthday of King Birendra in 1996, runs to around 120 pages ranging in subject matter from flowers, wild animals and birds, through gods, goddesses and temples, to dignitaries and personalities. A bid of £100 to £150 should secure the lot.

For a full auction catalogue, log on to www.mooreallen.co.uk