Earlier this year, our new data release added around 69,000 cases to the Railway Work, Life & Death project database of accidents to British and Irish railway workers. Those records can tell us a huge amount about a range of topics – including, of course, about the people who worked on the railways before 1939. As we’re currently in Disability History Month, we thought it was worth highlighting how we might use the database to find out more about disability in the past.
Disability History Month is marked annually in the UK between November and December. It provides an opportunity to direct attention to the contributions made by disabled people in the past as well as the present, and to campaign for improvements. Given our project’s focus on accidents, railway workers with disabilities have been particularly important people for us to find out more about, during Disability History Month and all year round. You can read more about a few of the disabled railway workers we’ve researched here. For this blog post we wanted to look at the life story of one man – William Parry.
William Parry’s 1911 accident
Perhaps unusually, we start part-way through William Parry’s life, with an accident. His details appeared in the Rhymney Railway Company records added to the project earlier this year. On 27 March 1911 he was working at Bargoed South signal box, in Glamorgan, south Wales. He was a signalman, the entry showed he sprained his arm at around 1pm. So far, so standard.
However, the additional detail raised more questions than it answered (as is often the way). In a marvellously domestic moment – though of course indicative of a sense of pride in the job and operationally important – William was dusting his signal box. He fell, and whilst trying to save himself, sprained his arm. Though he finished his shift, he was subsequently off work for seven days. Why did he fall?
The Company’s record gave an insight, in a very matter-of-fact way: William ‘has only one leg’. It appears he overbalanced – but nothing further was noted about the loss of the leg. Disabled railway staff returning to work as, amongst other roles, signalmen was fairly common at this time. The railway companies might have provided a dangerous workplace which caused life-changing injuries – but once you’d had an accident, you were often supported. The railway industry as a whole saw itself as being comprised of paternalistic employers. forms of support varied, but often included being found a new job with the company, better suited to what you were then (physically) able to do.
Back to the beginning – a railway family
William was born in south Wales in 1882. His parents were Leah and Thomas Parry. At the time of the 1901 Census, they had seven children living with them at home in Bargoed, Glamorgan. This included William and his younger brother Thomas H Parry – both of whom were working on the Rhymney Railway, listed as porters. Their father, Thomas (snr), was a track worker. It’s likely that Thomas was able to introduce the idea of working on the railway to his sons.
This was a literal and philosophical demonstration of the idea of the ‘railway family’ – a sense of the shared identity between railway workers across the UK. Appropriately, Leah, Thomas and William all lived in 1 Railway Terrace – another railway link that builds to the sense of the railway family. This idea is something we see time and time again in the railway industry, and we’ll return to it later in this blog.
William’s 1907 accident
By 12 June 1907, William was noted in the press as being a track worker, rather than a porter. Alongside his father, he was crossing the railway lines at Bargoed, by a pedestrian level crossing. A coal train had just passed through – but as it did every night, it was then scheduled to back into a siding. This manoeuvre went unnoticed, at least by William – and, at age 26, he was knocked down in front of his father. William received a compound fracture of his left leg and thigh. In addition, his hand was severely crushed & cut. Porter Watkins administered 1st aid.
As one press report put it: ‘The poor man was at once conveyed to Cardiff Hospital by a special train.’ We’ve seen this kind of special train before – it raises questions about the practicalities, but also about the fact that accidents were so common this was a ‘thing.’ Frustratingly it doesn’t look like we have the company record of the accident.
The records that survive show that William’s leg was amputated following the accident. He received 11/- compensation per week (around £71 now) from the Rhymney Railway Company, until he resumed work on 2 November 1908. This was a long convalescence, even for a major traumatic injury like a limb loss. How did William cope, mentally & physically? What support was provided, by the Rhymney Railway Company, his family, his friends, the Union & his community?
We know William was found alternative employment – as a signalman. This would have involved less movement or physical exertion than either a porter or a platelayer – though it was still physically demanding.
William’s personal and working life
Returning to William’s wider life, we know most about his family life – at least so far as the formal records can tell us. He married Elizabeth Amelia Baker in 1909, in Merthyr Tydfil. By 1911 they had a son, Ronald; by 1921 the family had grown to include two sons and three daughters. Throughout this time William had not moved far from home – from 1 Railway Terrace, Bargoed, to 3 Railway Terrace.
William joined the National Union of Railwaymen in 1925. He remained working as a signalman on the 1939 National Register. Evidently after his accident there was sufficient benefit in remaining with the Rhymey Railway to outweigh the trauma of losing a leg.
The Parrys as a railway family
We’ve already introduced the idea of the ‘railway family’ as both literal connections to the railways within a single family, and as a sense of imagined community linking workers who might not ever meet in person. It’s worth returning to this at the end of the post.
We’ve mentioned Thomas (snr) and his railway employment as potentially shaping the route for William and Thomas H. They weren’t the only ones in the family who worked for the Rhymney Railway. In 1911, son Edgar worked in the rail industry as a clerk; and living with Thomas and Leah was a nephew, who was a track worker. Also in 1911, William and Elizabeth Parry had a boarder living with them – another railway porter. By 1921, two male trackworkers were boarding with them.
One of William’s sisters, Gwyn, also joined the railway. Her start date isn’t known, but it’s probably during the First World War, when many more women were recruited into a wider range of roles. Gwyn joined the National Union of Railwaymen in 1919, listed as a crane driver – very much a temporary wartime role. By the 1921 Census Gwyn appears as a railway clerk for the Rhymney Railway.
All of these connections reinforce the need to look at railway staff and railway work in more detail. We can see how a sense of identity grew, particularly over long distance. This helps us see links between railway, people and place.