Accident South of Penrith Station
(27th December 1859)
ACCIDENT ON THE LANCASTER AND CARLISLE An inquest that was adjourned for the second time Tuesday week , was
resumed on Tuesday at the coffee house Carlisle, before Mr William Carrick Esq. Coroner ,
to investigate the circumstances attending the death of Richard Morris, an engine driver
on the Lancaster and Carlisle Railway. The deceased left Carlisle, driving a passenger
train for the south on Tuesday morning 27th Dec last , everything went on well until the
train reached a cutting called Hugh's Crag , situated about two and a half miles south of
Penrith station. On approaching the cutting , Morris was warned by a number of men who
waved their caps as a signal for him to pull up , which he accordingly did , and in a
moment or two after , he saw a ballast train a short distance in front of him , which had
been putting down men and materials in the cutting. The ballast train had moved off and
was going at the rate of eight or ten miles an hour and the passenger train when the
brakes were applied Was going at about twenty or twenty five miles an hour. According to
the rules of the company when a slow ballast train is in front and a fast train
approaching behind it , it is the duty of the ballast train manager to have a signalman
out at least 800 yards behind the train. The manager had had a signalman out at a quarter
of a mile behind the train but had recalled him without leaving another in his place. The
driver of the passenger train seeing that a collision was inevitable jumped from his
engine, landed on his feet but fell to the ground with one of his feet on the rail, the
wheels of the passenger train passed over it, the fireman remained on the engine having
hold of a rail and received no injury from the collision which took place immediately
after the driver leapt from the engine. The enginemen of the ballast train were uninjured.
The unfortunate driver of the express was taken to the infirmary at Carlisle where
amputation was deemed necessary, and he died two days after. The jury returned a verdict
of manslaughter against Barnaby Baines, inspector of permanent way and manager of the
ballast train on the morning of the collision. Westmorland Gazette Sat 14th January 1860
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