Within two years of the Thorpe disaster another terrible single line collision occurred, this time on the Somerset and Dorset Railway, where a similar telegraph and crossing order was in operation. Shortly before midnight on August the 7th, 1876, a down excursion train from Bath ran head on into an up relief from Wimborne near Foxcote signal box at Braysdown Colliery Siding on the section over the Mendips between Radstock and Wellow. Fifteen passengers were killed

Granted the defects of the system, the Norwich line had been efficiently worked for many years without mishap and the eleventh hour catastrophe was a cruel misfortune. The case of Radstock was quite otherwise. The Somerset and Dorset's extension to Bath on which the accident took place had only been opened for traffic two years before disaster and the operational methods were such that disaster was inevitable from the from the beginning. Indeed it was remarkable that the railway should have worked for even two years without serious accident. The public inquiry conducted by Captain Tyler disclosed a most shocking state of affairs. In the first place, Foxcote signal box had no right to exist at all. Its presence was a direct breach of the Company's customary undertaking, delivered under seal, that only one engine in steam should occupy any single line section at one time. For Foxcote was not a crossing station; it was merely a block post set in the middle of the three mile section between Radstock and Wellow which enabled two trains to follow one another through that section in flagrant breach of Board of Trade regulations.

The Company's lame excuse was that they thought that Foxcote constituted a station between sections in the meaning of the regulations. The line was equipped with block instruments, but the telegraphic arrangements left much to be desired. Radstock and Wellow were not in direct touch
with each other but could only communicate through the signalman at Foxcote. A telegraph control office at Glastonbury issued instructions to all crossing stations, but it had no communication with Foxcote at all so that the signalman there was left in blissful ignorance of any special arrangements which might have been made.

Even in the best of hands the working of such a system to pass an extremely heavy traffic (on the days of the accident alone there had been seventeen extra trains) would would have been fraught with peril, but when we read the roster of the Company's staff who were on duty on this fatal night the hair rises upon the scalp. The fact was that the construction of the extension to Bath had exhausted the Company's finances and they were attempting to run the railway with an inexperienced crew deficient in both quality and quantity.

It is true that the Midland and the London & South Western Railways had very recently come to the rescue of their ailing neighbour and had formed a joint managing committee, but their reforms had not yet taken effect, and there existed meanwhile a state of affairs that must surely have been without parallel on any English Railway.

In charge at Radstock was the telegraph clerk, Herbert John, a youth of eighteen who worked from 6.30 a.m. to 9.30 p.m. for a wage of 17s. 6d. a week. The signalman at Foxcote was another youth named Alfred Dando who had been with the Company four month and he was unable to read the telegraph instruments He admitted at the inquiry that he 'could not write well nor read excellent', not was he very strong. His only training as a signalman consisted of one week in the box at Radstock where he was unable to pull over the levers, yet John Jarrett, the Radstock stationmaster, said he thought he could manage the few levers at Foxcote and forthwith posted him there.

On the night of the disaster, John Hamlin, the driver of the up relief train, said he found the Foxcote distant signal lamp oout and the arm 'nearly at caution'. There was nothing unusual about this, he added. The signals were never lit for the simple reason that Dando was not supplied with enough paraffin for the lamps while the drivers knew that he was not strong enough to work the signals. Dando stopped him with a handlamp and then told him to proceed. The collision occurred a few moments later.

James Sleep, the Wellow stationmaster, had come on duty at 5.30 that morning. At 6.30 in the evening he went off to Midford 'chiefly for pleasure', as he put it, leaving in sole charge of the station Arthur Hillard, a boy of fifteen. Hillard's working hours, officially, were from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. but were often , as on this occasion, much longer. He not only worked the telegraph but issued tickets, and kept the station accounts. His wages were 7s. 6d. a week. These three, John, Dando and Hillard were the 'men' responsible for working the traffic on this August night while Stationmaster Sleep was making up for a long and thirsty day at Midford.

The evidence of Caleb Percy, the superintendent at Glastonbury control, gives a revealing glimpse of the of the chaos which prevailed on the Somerset and Dorset metals that Night. Percy was grossly overworked. He had come on duty at 9 o' clock that morning and in the normal course of events he would not have gone off duty until 11.30 p.m. As it was, owing to the accident, he was on duty until 8.30 the next morning. It was the height of the holiday season and throughout that long day it had been exacting task to find paths and arrange crossings for the seventeen extra trains which passed over that congested single line. Neither of the trains involved in the collision appeared in the working timetable.

The down train was the return working of an excursion to Bath regatta which was due to leave Bath at 9.15 p.m. The other train, the up special, had to be arranged on the spur of the moment to relieve the the 6.10 p.m. regular train from Bournemouth which was overcrowded. The first the station staffs knew of this train was when Percy sent out the following message at 7.18:

'Percy Glastonbury to all stations. A special train will leave Wimbourne at 7.10 for Bath I will arrange crossings' This message, of course, did not go to Foxcote and as neither Radstock nor Wellow advised him, the unfortunate Dando remained in ignorance of the existance of the train. The down excursion was extremely latefor it was not until 10.23 p.m. that Bath advised Glastonbury that it had left. From this time forward until the moment of collision both trains disappeared so far as Glastobury control was concerned. The harassed Percy and his telegraph clerk, Locke, made frantic efforts to trace them, but the replies they received were either conflicting and vague or sheer gibberish.

To begin with they could get no reply at all from Wellow until 11.13. Then, in answer to their question, 'where is down special?' the boy Hillard returned the enigmatic reply 'Over T'. Percy said he concluded from this that the Bath excursion must have been taken on the Foxcote block; in other words, it had passed through Wellow and was on its way to Radstock. But Hillard then added, 'Up is on from T'. From this Percy assumed that the excursion must have reached Radstock and there crossed the up relief train which was now on the Foxcote-Wellow block. Percy therefore told his clerk to get in touch with Herbert John at Radstock and the following fantastic exchange took place:

Glastonbury: 'Where is down special?'
Radstock: 'Don't know.'
Glastonbury: 'Where is special?'
Radstock: 'Good.'
Glastonbury: 'Where is special?'
Radstock: 'Good.'
Glastonbury: 'Do you refuse to answer my question?'
Radstock: 'Don't know.'

Asked afterwards why he had given a repeated 'OA' (good) signal in reply to Glastonbury's questons, John replied that they had often done the same to him. 'It is not pleasant to be treated so,' he said. And while those responsible were suffering from fits of pique and talking double Dutch to each other over their instruments, the farce ended in tragedy like a bad practical joke that has gone too far. Percy was informed of the collision at 11.37 p.m.

Not only had no timetable been drawn up for the working of the up relief train, but although the driver had crossed no less than six trains en route he had received only one verbal instruction and no written crossing orders. It transpired that the boy Hillard at Wellow had allowed the Bath excursion without advising Dando at Foxcote and without putting it on the block instruments which, it transpired, were frequently neglected in this way. Six minutes later, and before the excursion had reached Foxcote, Hillard had accepted the up relief train from Dando with the inevitable consequence.

The Radstock disaster revealed a stat of affairs so chaotic, so irresponsible and so lacking even the most elementary precautions that it was impossible to lay blame upon any particular individual. The whole staff were culpable and all were grossly overworked, shouldering responsibilities which they were quite unfitted by training to bear. This particularly applied to the wretched boy Hillard whose actions were the immediate cause of the accident. So Captain Tyler contented himself with the following terse conclusion: 'Railway working,' he said, 'under such conditions cannot, whatever the system employed, be expected to be carried on without serious accident.'

Happily for the west country travellers the Radstock accident roused the new joint managing committee of the S&DR to immediate and drastic action. So effectually was this ne're-do-well amongst railways reformed that it soon became one of the most efficient and smartly worked cross country lines in England. Much of the line has been double, while on such single that remain passenger trains can run to express schedules by means of automatic tablet exchange apparatus of which more anon. Hauling 'The Pines Express', streamlined 'West Country' pacifics now thunder past the sight of that illicit cabin at Foxcote where once the hapless Alfred Dando minded, or failed to mind, his unlit signals.

This is from L.T.C Rolt's Red For Danger-a Book about Railway accidents. This one in particular is the 1876 Radstock accident in all of it's glorious details as to how it all went wrong.

I'd like to know how this pertains to Equestria