A Haunting Mystery

My interest in railways and my research into the great days of steam and the 'Big Four' rail companies pre-nationalisation sometimes unearths some disquieting tales. This is no exception.

At 5:20am on 13th October 1928 a train crash occurred in Charfield, Gloucestershire. A goods train was being shunted off the main line to make way for an oncoming Leeds-Bristol mail express. However, the manoeuvre was not quite completed before the express train arrived, going at speed, and collided with the goods train. The momentum of the engine carried it under the bridge, but the passenger carriages piled up against it. The situation was made worse by the fact that the carriages were gas-lit, and the accident caused the gas cylinders to rupture and the gas to ignite. The four wooden carriages rapidly became an inferno, and the heat from the blaze impeded rescue efforts. 16 people were killed. All were identified expect for a boy aged around 12 and a girl of about 6, both badly burned.

The ticket collector who survived the crash remembered seeing two children board the train alone at Gloucester. He said that they were wearing school hats and described them as young persons of "reasonable means". Part of a breast pocket of a school blazer was found bearing a school motto, Luce Magistra, as well as two 9-inch-long shoes and part of a sock with the initials CSSS. Tailors and shoemakers over a large area were canvassed without result. Schools, churches and advertisements yielded not a single clue.

Surely someone was waiting for them at the first and only stop? No result there. No relative, friend, teacher or neighbour reported or knew them. Ultimately they were buried, the railway company taking responsibility for the formalities.

Of some curiosity was the fact that an unknown lady dressed in black used to visit the memorial to the crash victims in St James’s Church, Charfield (also the site of the children’s graves) for many years.

There are numerous theories about these children: one of these that they were illegitimate children of a royal dynasty whose existence (and deaths) had to be hushed up. Unlikely? There has never been a definitive answer and this haunting mystery remains.....