In this guest post, Francis Howcutt recounts the accidental death of Arthur Bott, a brother of his great grandfather. Arthur’s history is an example of how the railways helped provide the children of agricultural labourers with opportunities beyond their ancestral villages, as well as the associated dangers. One of the particularly nice things about this […]
Tag Archives | Midland Railway
Hezekiah Brett – ‘Cut in Two by an Express’
Francis Howcutt has looked at where his family history and railways met previously, in this blog post, so we’re delighted to welcome him back. In this post, Francis explores the story of Hezekiah Brett, a cousin of his 2x great grandfather. Sadly, Hezekiah committed suicide in 1895, but the reasons mentioned at the inquest may […]
The Oakworth Anti-Vaccinator’s Railway Accident
By Sylvia Valentine on June 6, 2022 in Accident reports, Blog, Family History, Guest contribution, Medical humanities, Urban History
One of the great things about this project is that it takes us in all sorts of unexpected directions. That includes the research and topics we’re exposed to – as in today’s guest blog post: another surprise that the apparently mundane topic of railway accidents has thrown up. There’s another aspect to the directions the […]
James Spridgeon, Railway Platelayer: Accidentally Killed in 1880
By Rosie Rowley on May 23, 2022 in Accident aftermath, Accident reports, Blog, Family History, Guest contribution, Local History, Urban History
This week’s blog post came about following a talk Mike gave at the U3A Family History Conference in Buxton in September 2019. Mike had a number of interesting conversations, including with this week’s guest author, Rosie Rowley. They discussed a case Rosie had found from her family history, also notable for the fact that the […]
John William Hawley, 1868-1909: A family tragedy remembered
By Megan Carswell on February 4, 2022 in Accident aftermath, Anniversary, Blog, Family History, Guest contribution
A year ago, we posted this blog about the 1909 Sharnbrook accident, which killed 2 railway workers. Shortly afterwards, we were contacted by this week’s guest author, Megan Carswell – the Great Niece of one of the men killed at Sharnbrook. A discussion followed, and we’re grateful that Megan was willing to do a bit […]
‘For God’s sake go and stop him’: The Sharnbrook crash, Feburary 1909
Something of a departure for our usual project focus, this week’s blog makes use of an accident report type we don’t usually have reason to include. Our project database so far draws largely from reports issued by the Railway Inspectors appointed solely to investigate accidents to workers (called Sub-Inspectors or Assistant Sub-Inspectors, producing the Appendix […]
Suicide Incidents on the Midland Railway, 1895-1901
In this guest blog post, one anonymous project volunteer looks at a very specific aspect noticed in the entries in the volume of one railway company’s casualty records: suicide. This is a challenging topic, in many ways, which might account for its neglect so far as railway history goes. We’ve previously featured a blog post […]
William Charles Lilley
By Archie McDermott-Paintin on June 21, 2021 in Blog, Family History, Guest contribution, Local History
This week our blog features a guest post from Archie McDermott-Paintin, a 2nd year History student at the University of Portsmouth. Archie worked with fellow student Marc Treloar (whose post was featured a couple of weeks’ ago) and project co-lead Mike Esbester on project data, including early access to our data release planned for later […]
A Brynamman Accident
On 5 June 1914 Midland Railway fireman Iestyn Newman Nash, 27, was working his turn at Brynamman, Carmarthenshire. Moving some coaches to prepare his train, he appears to have leaned out of the engine in order to watch for any signals from the guard. Somewhat ominously, the state report, taken by JJ Hornby, noted that […]
Dying for a wee – 1
As travellers today (when we’re able to resume travelling) we may be less than enamoured of the toilets on trains – all too often cramped, unclean or even out-of-order. But at least they’ve been provided for us. That isn’t always the case for staff – and that’s a long-standing issue. Earlier this year I wrote […]
