Transport: Misadventure at Winwick

At 60 m. p. h. the Euston-to-Blackpool express rocketed north through the night of the British midlands just west of Manchester, past the signal box at tiny Winwick Junction and smack into a puttering local. When the tumult had died and the ten dead had been laid out in the morgue, British Justice last week went ponderously to work on the facts. To an inquest at Warrington was summoned William Bloor.

William Bloor has been the signalman at Winwick Junction for 21 years. A tall, middleaged, careful-minded, precise-spoken Briton who had never before had an accident on his section, he spoke with genuine puzzlement: ”So far as the down line is concerned, my mind is a blank.”

At the time of the accident there were seven trains approaching, leaving or passing Signalman Bloor’s junction. He had just passed through a Manchester express, a westbound freight, the doomed local. He held up a cattle train behind the local to let a fish train pass south. Said he: “The fish train was the key to the movements in my mind.” Up from the south roared the fast express. Mr. Bloor got the fish train out of the way. “I was quite relieved in my mind.”

“But,” concluded Mr. Bloor, “I had forgotten all about the local train to Wigan.”

Into the awe-struck silence of the courtroom spoke Coroner Sir Samuel Brighouse last week: “Bloor has openly, and I think very openly, admitted that it was through an error on his part that the unfortunate occurrence took place. I think that Bloor was carrying out his duties as faithfully and honestly and as well as he could. If you believe that you will return a verdict of Misadventure.”

Thorough believers in British faith and honesty, the Coroner’s jury promptly brought in a verdict that the ten victims had died from a Misadventure.