A local accident – the death of Joseph Pratt, 1908
This page is one of a series introducing railway staff who worked on the south coast of England before 1939. They’ve been researched as part of the ‘Portsmouth Area Railway Pasts’ project – which you can read more about here, including accessing details of the other railway workers featured.
Research was undertaken from November 2024-July 2025, by a small group of volunteers from the Havant Local History Group, working with the University of Portsmouth’s History team. The work was funded by the University of Portsmouth’s Centre of Excellence for Heritage Innovation.
The workers featured were selected from staff who appear in the Railway Work, Life & Death project database of accidents to pre-1939 British and Irish railway workers.
On 29 August 1908 the Hampshire Chronicle reported an accident at Havant:
Fatal Accident. — A man named Joseph Pratt, 30 years of age, died on Wednesday morning as the result of injuries sustained on Thursday last week. He was engaged in coupling the Hayling Island engine at the railway station and got caught between the buffers. Internally injured, he was removed to his home, where he succumbed. Pratt was a great favourite among his comrades.
The Railway Work, Life & Death project database gives more details from the Railway Inspectorate section accident report. The accident occurred at Havant Station on 20 August 1908. Joseph was a porter on the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway. At 7.22 am he was crushed between the buffers and succumbed 6 days later.
The Inspector reported:
Pratt attempted to pass between the vehicles to couple by hand, but, before he could do so, the van rebounded from the buffer stops, and he was crushed between the buffers of the van and wagons and so injured he died sixth day following. There is no doubt that Pratt was acting with good intentions, but he acted very unwisely in attempting to pass between the vehicles before they had come to a stand, and to this the accident must be attributed.
Joseph was born in 1873, in Chichester. He married Kate Elizabeth Laggatt in 1896 when he was 22 and working as a “Porter”, presumably a railway porter. His wife was a domestic servant, and he had previously been a servant in West Street, Chichester, in the 1891 Census.
By 1901 he was living with his wife and two daughters (Violet and Gladys), a sister-in-law and a widowed visitor at 21 Waterloo Road in Havant. This was one of a row of terraced houses occupied by railway workers. A third daughter Cissie was born in 1904 following the birth in 1901 of a son, Thomas.
This undated photograph from Havant Museum’s collection from circa 1890 is of the Havant Station staff. Joseph was working at the Station from at least 1901 and possibly before. It is very likely that he worked with several of these men, and that the uniforms and setting would be very familiar to him.
This photograph, above, from around 1910, shows Havant Station, looking east from the north platform. It is looking in the direction of the green arrow on the map below. The footbridge is visible with the signal box on its right-hand side. The Hayling train is on the far side of the south platform and would have been where Jospeh was injured.
The annotated map shows the key locations. The accident site is marked by a blue cross. Number 21 Waterloo Road is shown in red on the above map, close to the signal box (S. B.). The north side of the house overlooks Havant station car park, previously the site of the rails and platform for the Hayling Island train. He would have had a short walk to work and lived within sight and earshot of the rhythm of the trains each day travelling along the coast and to London.
This photograph is from the east footbridge looking west into the station. The two main lines are in the centre. To the right is the goods yard with its wagons. To the left of the south platform is the “Puffing Billy” Hayling train, and the site of the accident.
The terraced house in Waterloo Road still exists behind the signal box. It retains the original joint wash house with its own chimney and would have been used each week on wash day.
Joseph had been a member of the of Havant Friendly Society and had attended the dinner held at the Black Dog Inn for the Committee for the Amalgamated Friendly Societies. Following the dinner a concert was held, and Joseph was one of the singers, giving a rendition of “They are the best friends of all.” The Hampshire Post and Southsea Observer on 29 November 1907 reported the Friendly Society as a thrift society, holding and investing the savings of its members. The Black Dog still exists although no longer as a pub.
In September 1908 at the Friendly Societies Demonstration Committee meeting at the Black Dog a vote of condolence to his widow was unanimously passed, the members remarking upon his diligence as a worker for the society (Hampshire Post and Southsea Observer, 7 September 1908).
Joseph was buried on 29 August 1908 in the Municipal Cemetery, Havant, grave number 1879. His now unmarked grave in the centre of the photograph lies against the west wall of the main cemetery, approximately under the “T” in Cemetery marked on the map above. Havant Museum hold maps of the plots in the Cemetery.
His home, work and grave lie within a few hundred yards of each other.
The Railway Work, Life & Death project database contains no other details for Joseph. This suggests he was not a member of the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants trade union for a compensation claim to be made or help given from the Union for his family.
By the 1911 Census Joseph’s wife and four children had moved to 92 West Street Havant, on the other side of Havant town centre. Her occupation was given as a Fruiterer. Also living there were her father (a fruit hawker) and her brother (a general labourer). The family had come together to help make a way forward.
Geoff Robinson