The Round Oak railway accident happened on 23 August 1858 between Brettell Lane and Round Oak railway stations, on the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway. The breakage of a defective coupling caused seventeen coaches and one brake van, containing about 450 passengers, of an excursion train to run backwards down the steep gradient between the stations, colliding with a following second portion of the excursion. 14 passengers were killed and 50 injured in the disaster. In the words of the Board of Trade accident inspector, Captain H. W. Tyler, it was at the time "decidedly the worst railway accident that has ever occurred in this country".
Circumstances of the accident
On 23 August 1858 the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway ran a special day excursion from Wolverhampton to Worcester and back. It was intended to be for school children and their teachers only, but this ruling was not adhered to and the train was packed with roughly equal numbers (about 750 of each) of children and adults. The train left Wolverhampton at 9.12 AM, comprising 42 four-wheeled coaches and four brake vans. Braking of the train was supplied entirely by manual application of brakes on the engine (and tender) and the four brake vans (each van manned by a guard).
Guard Cooke was in the rear brake van of the train, together with six passengers, who should not have been there. Cooke and his passengers were drinking and smoking in the van, and Cooke invited passengers to apply the van handbrake. Correct operation of the brake was necessary, not only to slow the train, but also to control the tension in the carriage couplings. There were three separate breakages of couplings ahead of the rear brake van on the outward journey: at Brettell Lane and Hagley both the main screw couplings and side safety chains failed, and at Droitwich it was found that another screw coupling was failed, but its associated side chains had held. Cooke made temporary repairs on all three occasions. To repair the first two breakages, Cooke managed to find spare three-link or screw couplings; but at Droitwich he was only able to patch up the side chains, which were not designed to hold the full weight of a train. On arrival at Worcester, the train was examined by the inspector of rolling stock: the repaired/replaced side chains were replaced by four-link goods couplings before the return journey, but no attempt was made to repair or replace failed centre couplings: these were difficult to access, and the inspector considered that a re-made screw coupling was weaker than the goods couplings (which he considered adequate).
The accident
On the return journey, the excursion train was divided into two portions: the first, with Guard Cooke in the rear brake van, comprised 28 coaches and two brake vans pulled by one locomotive as far as Stourbridge where a second locomotive was attached; and the second comprised 14 coaches and two brake vans, hauled by one locomotive. There was a 1 in 75 rising gradient between Brettell Lane and Round Oak, and the line was worked on the interval system, in which trains were allowed to follow the previous train without positive confirmation that it had reached the next station, relying instead on it having been an adequate (specified) time interval ahead at the last station. The first train reached Round Oak at about 8.10 pm; as it drew to a halt a foreman-platelayer heard a loud 'snap' as the coupling behind the eleventh coach broke and 17 coaches and the rear brake van began to roll back down the incline towards Brettell Lane. The booking clerk at Round Oak, seeing the runaway, attempted to telegraph Brettell Lane to give warning, but he was unable to attract the attention of the clerk there. The second train had reached Brettell Lane about eleven or twelve minutes behind the first, and therefore was clear to proceed to Round Oak. The line ran in a series of curves, limiting forward visibility, the night was dark, there were no lights in the coaches, excursion trains did not have to have a red light on the rearmost vehicle, and smoke was blowing across the line from neighbouring factories; consequently the crew of the second train did not see the runaway coaches until they were about 300 yards away. The second train had virtually drawn to a standstill when the runaway coaches collided with it. The locomotive of the second train remained on the rails and was only superficially damaged; the same was not true of the runaway coaches. Cooke's brakevan and the two coaches next to it were, in the words of the inspector "broken all to pieces", killing 14 passengers and badly injuring 50 more.