"Mizter T" wrote

Never heard of anything like that, it's very interesting. I'm now
wondering whether there were ever any other similar examples,
excluding times when engineering works or something else going wrong
necessitated it (like the recent occasions when GNER terminated at FP
- I hear it was mayhem, and I guess it was similarly chaotic at Harrow
& Wealdstone when Virgin had to stop/start short there).

I can't think of other cases where a London suburban station has been used
as the terminus of a long-distance train in regular working to avoid use of
the normal terminal station.

There have of course been other 'engineering' examples, like use of Ealing
Broadway for some trains during the 1967 resignalling of Paddington (others
diverted to Marylebone or Kensington Olympia). Summer trains to the Kent
Coast or Hastings have been known to start from Elephant & Castle or New
Cross, though I think that some of them ran ecs from the terminus.

Peter