Accidents
As an electric train running about five minutes late entered New Bridge station on the morning of Tuesday 10th March 1908, the passengers who got up to leave as soon as possible soon lost their balance, some falling over, as the three-car train hit the buffers at the end of No.4 platform. The shock of the collision caused panes of glass to be broken and although “every one in the train received a more or less severe shock” most continued to travel to work, although two returned home - both suffering from shock and one of them with a bruised elbow. The damaged train was placed in a siding to await repairs. Damage to the train, other than two windows being broken, was damage to a buffer and one of the seats uprooted by “the weight of one city traveller”.47 Despite most passengers seeming fine with only two having injury of note, £2,237 7s 9d was paid in compensation by the North Eastern Railway!
An electric train was leaving Manors East on 1st March 1913 when an empty passenger stock train collided with it in the rear. Although the damage was described as ‘not serious’, 49 passengers were injured. The accident at Manors caused one newspaper piece to muse as to the dangers of the new electric trains: “...the wonder must be that more people were not injured, and that there were was not a considerable loss of life. Electric trains have a peril which is distinctly their own, and the man who might be foredoomed to be in a railway collision, would, if he had the choice, hardly hesitate to choose a train drawn by a steam locomotive. The danger of fire owing to a short circuit is obviously serious. And, in addition to this, there is in the case, especially of long corridor carriages, the risk - exemplified at the Manors - of the buckling of the carriages, making it impossible to open the doors. To be severely shaken is bad enough - the possibility of incineration is worse”.48
The accident was due to the signalman not putting the home signal back to danger after the train had passed him; the signalman “candidly admitted his mistake” in the inquiry that he had pulled the wrong lever when the train went past “and the only explanation he could give was that he was very busy at the time”. The inspector from the Board of Trade, Lt.-Col. P. G. von Donop, pointed out in the report that the driver of the empty train did not see the electric train in time owing to the curvature of the line and the station buildings and recommended the NER provide an additional up signal. Von Donop was also confident that the signalman’s error was a bona fide mistake and although the inquiry did show irregularities in the working of the signal box they did not directly contribute to the accident.
The NER assured him that the matter would be dealt with.49
The NER made mention of the accident in its monthly staff magazine: “The circumstances attending the accident at the Manors Station, Newcastle, on March 1, exemplified the advantages of an ambulance training for railwaymen, and, we are informed, the coolness and promptitude of ticket collector George Forster, ticket collector W. W. White, porters R. Savage and D. Jack, clerk W. Hay and electrician A. O’Neill may have in many cases saved complications in the injuries of the passengers to whom they attended. The work of Mr. Forster was specially commended by the Newcastle Infirmary authorities, and
