Postcard, Shrewsbury Express Train Disaster, Searching for the Dead

Postcard, Shrewsbury Express Train Disaster, ‘Searching for the Dead’ amongst the wreckage of the London & North Western Railway overnight sleeping car and mail train, October 15th 1907, 87mm x 139mm.

This postcard depicts the wreckage of a derailed train at Shrewsbury, Shropshire, 15 October 1907. The accident happened in the early hours of the morning, when a London & North Western Railway train from Manchester to the west of England was derailed on a sharp curve on the approach to the station.

The train was made up of Royal Mail and sleeper carriages and the wooden bodies of several of them were completely smashed by the impact. Eighteen people were killed and thirty-three injured. The dead included eleven passengers, three postal workers who had been sorting mail, the driver and fireman. The official enquiry was unable to establish the cause of the accident, but suggested that the driver had momentarily dozed off, missed a signal and approached the station much too fast.

The train was pulled by the 4-6-0 locomotive 'Stephenson', one of the London & North Western Railway's Experiment class. Some newspapers criticised the company for using what they mistakenly believed was an experimental locomotive on a main line passenger service.