This page is one of a series introducing railway staff who worked in and around Stoke-on-Trent before 1939. They’ve been researched as part of the ‘Tracks through Time’ initiative – which you can read more about here.
The workers featured were largely selected from staff who appear in the Railway Work, Life & Death project database of accidents to pre-1939 British and Irish railway workers.
Please note that a fuller life story is under preparation – coming soon!
Thomas Palfreyman lived in the Fenton area of Stoke-on-Trent. He worked for the North Staffordshire Railway as a platelayer – someone who maintained the tracks.
On 26 February 1898, aged 28, he was run over and killed – for platelayers this was a sadly common type of accident. He left a widow, Lizzie (27), and four children: Evelyn (7), Lucy (6), Thomas (3) and William (1).
Lizzie was able to keep the youngest children with her, but Evelyn and Lucy went into the Derby Railway Orphanage. They probably never lived with their mother again.