Shadows in the Steam

by David Brandon

  Nothing untoward happened for an hour, when he decided to get some fresh air. He opened the door and stood at the top of the steps. It was a beautiful still night, only the bark of a fox or an occasional distant motorbike disturbing the otherwise almost tangible and immense silence around him. Suddenly he felt a wave of fear flooding over him and became convinced that his every move was being watched by eyes all the more threatening because he had no idea where they were. As he stepped back into the box, had he caught sight of some kind of fleeting shadow up near the ceiling? He could not be sure, but he felt certain that he was not alone and that something invisible was scrutinising his every move. How pleased he was when his shift ended.

  On the third night and at the same time he heard the footsteps once more. He was clearly a man of courage because although his nerves were by now becoming somewhat shredded, he once again took up his poker and torch and rushed down the stairs. The sound of footsteps faded away to be followed to his horror by an ear-piercing scream close by. He flashed his torch in the direction of the sound and saw to his horror what looked like a human body lying by the side of the track. As he went to investigate, wondering whether someone had been knocked down by a train, the thing on the ground simply faded away.

  He had now decided that he too would now look for another job on the railway which did not involve night shifts in lonely signal boxes at spots where such unnerving things happened. He lost touch with his friend, but some years later he discovered that a man had been killed on the line close to his box. He also learned that other signalmen had had similar experiences on the night shift but understandably had chosen to keep their experiences to themselves for fear that their colleagues might ridicule them or that management might think they were not up to the job. Had his friend also had similar experiences?

  Bradley Fold Station Signal box. A typical timber-built Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway Co. wayside signal box.

  The line through Bradley Fold lost its passenger services in 1970. Freight services followed shortly after.

  Manchester Mayfield

  This was Manchester’s ‘forgotten’ railway terminus. By the first decade of the twentieth century the six platforms of the London & North Western Railway Co.’s part of London Road Station were proving inadequate for handling the growing traffic, particularly the increase in the number of suburban trains when the Styal Line opened. The London Road site could not be expanded and so a decision was taken to build an ‘overspill’ station as close by as possible. This station, known as Manchester Mayfield, was opened in 1910. It was small, having only four platforms, and was joined to its ‘parent’, London Road, by a long and gloomy enclosed footbridge.

  It was used on a regular basis by various short-haul suburban services and regular travellers may have resented the walk to get to Mayfield, but at least they knew the ropes. The station was also used as an ‘overspill’ for long-distance trains at particularly busy periods such as summer Saturdays. Many were the stories of woebegone passengers arriving with very little time to spare at London Road only to find to their bemusement or fury that their train was scheduled to leave immediately from the Mayfield platforms, which were best part of half a mile away! Then followed a heart-palpitating dash with their luggage along London Road’s platforms, up the steps, along the footbridge and down into Mayfield, with the odds being that the traveller would be just in time to see his train steaming away into the distance.

  Occasional travellers may not even have been aware that Mayfield existed and, indeed, it spent its life thoroughly in the shadow of its mighty neighbour. A massive rebuilding of London Road Station took place in association with the electrification of the lines to Crewe and later Stoke, Stafford and London Euston. This eliminated the need for Mayfield’s extra capacity and it closed to passengers on 26 August 1960. The rebuilt London Road Station opened on 12 September 1960 and was renamed ‘Manchester Piccadilly’, although ‘London Road’ did actually give a much better idea of exactly where the station was located in the city.

  Mayfield was never a very prepossessing station, and it did not help that it was hit by a German bomb during the Second World War. Those who worked there may either have welcomed it as a rest cure after the hurly-burly of London Road or Manchester’s other three big stations or resented the feeling that they had been shunted into a semi-forgotten backwater. Whether this was responsible we will never know, but one station worker hanged himself in a cabin full of electrical equipment, and a foreman allowed things to get so much on top of him that he also hanged himself, but did so in the gentlemen’s toilets. A porter on the night shift fell to his death down the shaft of the luggage lift.

  These events may have hung like a pall over the place, and Mayfield got a reputation for being spooked. Footsteps were heard walking deserted platforms on many occasions in the hours of darkness. One rail worker on the night-shift was sitting in his cabin when slouching footsteps shuffled past. He opened the door to peek out. No one was there but a distinct chill could be felt on what was actually a very humid summer’s night. One man twice experienced footsteps dogging his own as he walked to the station entrance in the middle of the night, having just finished his shift. Although scared, on the second occasion he was near the main collection of switches for the station lights and he flicked on all those which had been turned off in the semi-darkened station. Nothing was there.

  In 1970 Mayfield became a rail-served parcels depot, and continued in that role until 1986 since when it has been disused, although it provided an ideal base for a drug dealer’s activities in an episode of the excellent TV drama Prime Suspect. At the time of writing (autumn 2008) the shell of Mayfield is still there. Various proposals have been made for it to return to use as a passenger station, to become a coach station or be part of a comprehensive redevelopment of this underused quarter on the fringe of the city centre. The ghosts, meanwhile, can roam in peace.

  Typical LNWR lower-quadrant signals guard the approach to and exit from Manchester Mayfield Station.

  HAMPSHIRE

  Hayling Island

  Hayling Island is a low-lying island standing between Chichester Harbour in the east and Langstone Harbour in the west. It enjoyed quite a vogue as a minor resort before British holidaymakers took advantage of cheap air travel to those foreign parts where sunshine is more surely guaranteed. Sailing is possible, as is windsurfing, and some people regard Hayling Island as the place where the latter sport was invented. The island is joined to the mainland at Havant by a road bridge.

  The Hayling Railway Co. opened a line across a timber viaduct from Havant in 1867 and the London, Brighton & South Coast Railway took over in 1872. The Langstone Viaduct was of comparatively light construction which placed severe restrictions on the locomotives that could work over it. The LBSCR’s tiny but powerful ‘Terrier’ tank engines proved absolutely ideal and came to monopolise the working, and will for ever be associated with the quaint little branch line. The line generated great affection and was known as ‘Hayling Billy’. Unfortunately it did not generate similarly great revenue.

  The line closed in 1963 but for some years after there were reports that the neighbourhood of the old Hayling Island Station was haunted by the ghost of a railway guard who had worked on the line back in the 1930s and ’40s and presumably couldn’t bear to be parted from it even in death. Other people claimed that the ghost was none other than that of a former stationmaster at Hayling Island.

  Swanwick

  Swanwick is a station on the Fareham to Netley and Southampton line which is still operational. The section through Swanwick was opened in 1889 by the London & South Western Railway.

  In 1971 a man standing on Swanwick Station late one night was watching his only fellow-passenger. It was a woman who looked distressed and confused. She was crying and kept repeating the words, ‘I can’t go back.’ The train arrived and he wanted to help her get on because it was the last train that night. However, the guard was getting impatient with both of them and s
o he had no option but to leave her behind. Her evident distress worried him and he decided to phone the police when he got off the train. He did this, telling them where she was and that he thought she was probably at risk – perhaps suicidal. Next day he was browsing through a local paper which contained a story about a woman who had been hit and killed by a train at Swanwick a couple of nights earlier. There was a photograph of the victim. It was the distressed woman he had seen only the night before.

  View of the Swanwick Station buildings from the street. The station is served by trains running between Southampton and Portsmouth.

  HERTFORDSHIRE

  Hatfield

  After legal and parliamentary wrangling of monumental proportions, in 1846 the Great Northern Railway obtained sanction to build a main line from London to the neighbourhood of Doncaster. Services began in 1850. Some were long-distance expresses, but shorter-distance trains which we would now probably call outer-suburban ran from London to Hatfield to a station which was on a slightly different site from the current one.

  The paranormal experience at Hatfield definitely casts the ghost in a positive role as a benefactor. In the 1900s a non-stop passenger train was passing through the platforms at the old Hatfield Station. The driver was rather put out when what he described as ‘an insubstantial man’ apparently leapt onto the footplate despite the fact that the train was moving quite quickly. This apparition, who exuded an unpleasant chilliness, somehow made it clear to the driver that he must slow the train and stop at the next station going southwards, which was Potters Bar. On arrival there the driver, already shaking like a leaf, started shaking more violently, but with relief rather than fear because he saw ahead of his train a large obstacle on the line. If he had continued at his normal speed the train would have crashed into this obstacle and there might have been a frightful accident. Turning round to express his gratitude, he realised that the apparition had vanished. What is to be made of this?

  ISLE OF WIGHT

  Newport

  The Isle of Wight has often been described as a microcosm of southern England, although it is only twenty miles east and west by thirteen miles north and south. Its entire route mileage is a mere forty-five miles, and yet the lines involved had originally been projected by no fewer than six separate companies. The first line to be opened on the island was the Cowes & Newport in 1862. If anywhere was the hub of the railways on the Isle then it would have to be Newport. From there lines radiated north, south, east and west.

  Since the lines closed, there have been many reports of strange phenomena around the site of the former railway installations at Newport. At the site of the old station, a man looking like a platelayer has been seen walking along swinging a lantern, and he has the ability to walk through walls and doors. A steam train with three coaches has been reported travelling soundlessly along the formation of one of the old lines. Others claim to have heard this ghost train. Yet other people claim to have seen and heard it.

  Newport can be described as the hub of the Isle of Wight’s former extensive railway system.

  KENT

  Pluckley

  The strategic importance of Dover as the gateway to and exit from England inevitably meant that the building of a line between it and London was discussed at an early stage. The first company to build such a line would be able to tap into a major and lucrative source of traffic. The South Eastern Railway grabbed the opportunity, and its main line was authorised by Parliament in June 1836. The line was opened in sections and completed throughout to Dover in 1843. Pluckley is the last station before Ashford on the line from London.

  Pluckley has the reputation of being England’s most haunted village. The ghosts come in various forms and several are associated with the local landowning family, the Derings. A ‘Red Lady’ wearing a fifteenth-century gown flits around the church and the churchyard, apparently searching for the burial place of her baby. The family lived in a manor house nearby which burnt down, but the site is haunted by a ‘White Lady’ holding a red rose who occasionally also puts in an appearance in the churchyard. Mysterious noises have been heard issuing from the Dering chapel in the church. There is a pub with a poltergeist, a ghostly monk, a ghostly miller and a spectral tramp (piquant variations on normal themes), a spooky old gypsy woman and the ghost of a highwayman who, as his kind tend to do, lurks by a crossroads which in this case has the lovely name of Fright Corner. Others could be mentioned. Just for good measure, the railways have got in on the act. The ghost of a man knocked down and killed by a train has been seen on the track near the station,and steam trains have been heard whistling on many occasions since regular steam operations ceased. No one claims to have seen the locomotive doing the whistling.

  A weather-boarded station building, very appropriate to Kent. This all looks very peaceful given that some people say that Pluckley is the most haunted village in England.

  LANCASHIRE

  Bispham

  Blackpool and trams are as inseparable as fish and chips. Trams started operating in Blackpool in 1885 along part of the seafront, and this line was actually the first electric street tramway in Britain. By 1892 these trams were operating between the North and South Pier.

  In 1898 a more ambitious operation was started by the Blackpool & Fleetwood Electric Tramway Co. which linked Blackpool North Station with Fleetwood via a line which mostly ran close to the coast and which included stretches of reserved track. In 1920 Blackpool Corporation bought the company and combined its operations with their own.

  Trams started becoming unfashionable in the UK in the 1930s, being thought of as outdated and too redolent of the working class and of Victorian England. Much of Blackpool’s tram system was replaced by motor buses and the only route to survive has been that on the continuously built-up part of The Fylde between Starr Gate and Fleetwood. It is now operated by Blackpool Transport Services Limited.

  A few miles north of central Blackpool is the suburb of Bispham. Here at the northern extremity of the resort’s famous ‘illuminations’ is one of the most grandiose tram stops anywhere in the world. Vastly outdoing many of today’s minimalist unmanned railway halts, this building draws attention to itself by the words ‘Bispham Station’ incised above what can only be described as a portico. It was built in 1932. After having waxed so enthusiastic about this tram station, the authors have to accept that its connection with the world of ghosts is something of an anti-climax. On stormy nights a figure has been seen close to the station, walking purposefully along the track and carrying a lamp. As with so many of its kind, this mysterious figure vanishes when approached. No one seems to have any idea who he is and why he chooses to walk only in bad weather.

  Entwistle

  The line through Entwistle opened in 1848. It joined the important industrial towns of Bolton and Blackburn and came under the control of the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway. This line passes through surprisingly green countryside giving the lie to the idea that south Lancashire was all satanic mills and chimneys. The station, which is located on a long climb from Bolton at 1 in 74, stood about 690ft above sea level and is a bleak spot for much of the time. It was an odd station with an island platform and an elevated signal box on girders straddling the tracks bypassing the platform. The line, now reduced to two tracks, is still operational although reduced in importance and carrying much less traffic.

  In the late 1930s there were several occasions when the ethereal-looking figure of a child was seen running across the tracks and then, still running, crossing fields before disappearing into the distance. All who saw this apparition believed it to be the ghost of a young boy who had been run down and killed by a train during the First World War.

  This unfortunate boy was not the only supernatural entity that inhabited the hills and valleys of the north-west of England, especially Lancashire. A more terrifying one was that experienced by a signalman in his lonely eyrie at Entwistle. On many occasions he heard the dreaded eldritch cry of a boggart. It is this chilling cry whi
ch has earned the boggart its alternative name of ‘shrieker’, although in some parts of the north it goes by the other names such as ‘barguest’ or ‘trash’. Regarded as an omen of death, the boggart usually takes the form of an enormous black or white dog, shaggy, fierce and with enormous staring eyes. Boggarts can take human form and are usually malevolent, but well-wishing boggarts were sometimes known to help out with tedious household chores. The rugged moors around Entwistle are excellent boggart country. The presence of these beings is remembered in the name of a public park in north Manchester called Boggart Hole Clough.

  Entwistle Station on the Bolton to Blackburn line can be a bleak spot. The route was once busy enough to warrant quadruple tracks. Note the elevated signal box to give the signalman the best view of the tracks under his control.

  Helmshore to Ramsbottom

  The origin of the East Lancashire Railway lies with a line opened in 1846 linking Manchester to Bury via Clifton Junction and Radcliffe. This then proceeded along the Rossendale Valley through such delightful sounding places as Ramsbottom and Summerseat to Rawtenstall. An extension from Stubbins, just north of Ramsbottom, to Accrington, complete with ferocious gradients around Baxenden as steep as 1 in 38 and 1 in 40, was opened in 1848. The ELR was later absorbed by the Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway.