Shadows in the Steam

by David Brandon

  Auldearn formerly had a wayside station on what became the Highland Railway’s part of the Inverness to Aberdeen line. It closed in 1960.

  Dunphail to Dava

  In the 1840s complicated networks of railway lines were opening up in the heavily populated and industrialised Scottish Lowlands with their abundant coal and other mineral resources. Naturally the railway companies involved invested enthusiastically in this part of Scotland, licking their lips at the prospect of the lucrative returns from the business that was likely to be generated in that region. They were not so eager to turn their attention to the building of lines in the much more sparsely populated and less promising areas north and west of Perth. This left the citizens of Inverness and various other northern Scottish towns nursing a strong sense of grievance. It was already evident that railways were powerful generators of industrial and commercial activity and that those places that were left off the railway map or poorly served by railways were likely to stagnate and suffer from literally being off the beaten track.

  This issue rumbled on for years without anything very positive happening. The Highlanders advanced the argument that much of northern Scotland had been opened up as a result of the roads built by General Wade in the eighteenth century. These roads had been largely paid for by the Government and, despite being designed primarily for military purposes, they had brought many economic benefits to impoverished parts of Scotland. Wasn’t it therefore time for the Government to reinvigorate the area by providing incentives for railway development in the region? Appeals for Government largesse fell on deaf ears, however. In the late 1840s local businessmen in Inverness began to consider the building of a railway to Aberdeen as far as possible along the south shore of the Moray Firth through Nairn, Forres and Elgin and then southwards using a number of river valleys to Aberdeen. This, at the time, seemed like the only feasible route to Aberdeen, the Lowlands and England. It was a roundabout route, but better than nothing. Some of the Aberdonian business community in turn were considering a railway from their city towards Inverness, using much the same route.

  Inverness people would have preferred a route southwards towards Perth and the Lowlands, but the terrain between the two places seemed insurmountable given the power of steam locomotives at the time. In the event the Inverness party went ahead with obtaining parliamentary approval for a line eastwards to Nairn being built in the hope of benefiting the two linked towns, but apparently also as being seen as the possible first leg of a route to Perth. The Nairn line opened for passengers in November 1855, isolated from any other railway lines. In 1858 the Nairn line was extended eastwards to meet the Great North of Scotland line from Aberdeen at Keith.

  The Nairn line had a very beneficial impact on the economies of Inverness and Nairn and it was not long before the idea of the Perth route resurfaced. Such a line, it was believed, would even more effectively put Inverness ‘on the map’. The Inverness & Perth Junction Railway was set up in a heady wave of enthusiasm not least because technology had moved on rapidly and locomotives could now be designed to scale the lofty summits required of a line south to Perth. The first sod was cut in October 1861 for a line south from Forres to Dunphail, across Dava Moor to Aviemore and on to Kingussie, Blair Athol and Perth. Crossing Dava Moor involved gradients of 1 in 70, and the exposed moors in the vicinity were particularly susceptible to heavy snow. This particular part of the route opened in 1864 and later became part of the financially challenged Highland Railway.

  It was on the Forres to Aviemore section of what had by then become part of the Highland Railway that a mysterious event occurred in October 1919. A man who lived at the hamlet of Achanlochen had been spending the evening with a friend at Berryburn, and it was approaching midnight on a brightly moonlit night when he left to cycle home, intending to make some use of a track that ran along the side of the railway. When he got there, suddenly in front of him was a light so brilliant that he was forced to look away. Confused and not a little frightened, he got off his bicycle to attempt to investigate the phenomenon only to find it gradually fading away before he was any the wiser about what had caused it. As he made his way home, he was totally perplexed and must have wondered whether he had been hallucinating. He slept fitfully and resolved first thing the next morning to return to the railway and find out whether anyone else had seen the light. Here he was in luck because the first railwayman he met had also been out the previous night and seen the same mysterious bright light. He reported that a number of other people had also seen it. No one could provide any rational explanation and the general consensus was that something supernatural was at the bottom of the mystery. Whatever it was, there were no reports before nor have there been any since.

  It may be churlish to mention it, but opinions on the reliability of the witness may be influenced by the fact that about two years earlier he claimed to have seen a cattle train on fire in the sky! Being charitable, we could say that this was associated with a previous accident on the line in which a cattle train had caught fire and the unfortunate creatures had all been immolated. Could it be that the powerful spirit associated with this part of Scotland had some influence on what he saw or thought he saw? After all, there are several distilleries close by.

  The line across Dava Moor closed in 1965. The southern end of the line has reopened as the Strathspey Railway.

  Kyle of Lochalsh

  The fabled line from Dingwall to Kyke of Lochalsh was built by the Dingwall & Skye Railway Co. and was intended in the first instance to provide a boost for the livestock farmers of the districts through which it passed, enabling them to deliver their animals to the markets quickly by rail and in far better condition than if they had been herded on the hoof for hundreds of miles. It was also intended to help the fishing communities of what was then part of Ross & Cromarty to despatch their highly perishable catches far more quickly to markets in the more highly populated parts of Scotland.

  The Highland Railway took the line over in 1877. Until 1897 the ‘Road to the Isles’ terminated at Strome Ferry but an extension to Kyle of Lochalsh opened in that year. Protestant fundamentalism was rife in these parts and not all of the meagre local population welcomed the development of railways. Sabbatarianism was deeply entrenched in these parts and led to many problems at Strome Ferry after the line opened and the railways tried to move wagons containing fish on a Sunday, this being generally held as a day on which no work for gain should under any circumstances be carried out. Obviously fish was a highly perishable cargo which the company needed to move as quickly as possible. No Sunday trains normally ran on the line, so attempting to run a special train on a Sunday in 1883 evoked ferocious and self-righteous wrath from the locals. A group of fishery workers refused to load a consignment of herrings and a fight broke out when the managers of the fishing company tried to load the fish. The Highland Railway was an impecunious company and it needed all the revenue it could get, and so it appealed to the Home Secretary. He despatched a force of burly Edinburgh police officers to ensure that the law was observed and tempers were allowed to cool. This did the trick. The sequel to this incident occurred when the Highland Railway billed the constabulary for the train fares of the officers who had travelled to Strome Ferry. The company graciously gave a discount on the fares but that made no difference to the Commissioner of Police who flatly refused to pay, failing to see why his force should pay the Highland for the privilege of protecting the company’s own property.

  While Sabbatarianism provoked this militancy, many of the local population had their misgivings about the coming of the railways per se, largely because they were seen as ‘unnatural’ and also because they would open up this hitherto remote part of Scotland to all the malign, godless influences of modern civilisation. The Highland folk were great believers in omens and, shortly before the extension to Kyle of Lochalsh was completed, many of them claim to have seen a spectral steam-hauled train rushing balefully along the road leading to the Kyle. This apparition manifested itself on
ly at night, but the locomotive made a fearful sight because it belched fire and brimstone and was equipped with piercing headlights. It cavorted down the narrow road and then eventually veered off across the nearby hills and lochs. Obviously no good could come of such an omen.

  As a footnote to the issue of Sabbatarianism, it is worth recording that after the Tay Bridge Disaster, several clergymen used the event as the subject for their sermons and dwelt with undisguised relish on the fate of those who had so heinously chosen to travel by train on a Sunday.

  The Glasgow Subway

  Glaswegians have a great affection for the underground railway that serves their city, or at least some parts of it. They call it the ‘Clockwork Orange’, or the ‘Subway’, refusing to kow-tow to the city fathers who would prefer to dignify it with the name ‘Underground’. The route is about six and a half miles in length, not circular in shape, and it serves fifteen stations. It opened to the public on 14 December 1896.

  It may be a small system but in proportion to its length it has done quite well for attracting mysterious events. The best-known of these is the story of the so-called ‘Grey Lady’ whose ghost has reportedly been seen in the tunnels around Shields Road Station in what is now a very lonely and depopulated part of the ‘Southside’. In 1922 a woman and a small girl inexplicably fell off an almost empty platform onto the track. A station worker leapt to their rescue. His gallant effort saved the girl but the woman died. Her spirit has seemingly refused to leave the scene.

  One night the trains had stopped running and were being marshalled for maintenance purposes at the Govan depot. One of the tasks of the workers on the night shift was to check that no passengers were actually left on board – those who perhaps had fallen asleep, for example. On this occasion a team of five men passed through a number of carriages and, sure enough, there was a man apparently happily dozing, dressed in a raincoat and wearing a flat cap like so many thousands of others in the city. They woke him up and told him that he had to follow them through the empty rolling stock and out to the street entrance. He seemed perfectly amenable although rather slow on his feet, and he followed them as instructed. They repeatedly looked back to allow him to catch up and they had just got to the exit from the depot when they looked back for the final time only to find that he had vanished into thin air! There was absolutely nowhere that he could have secreted himself. The men searched high and low and with great care but they found no trace of him. Completely baffled, they knew they hadn’t been seeing things. To this day, this mysterious appearance and disappearance has never been explained.

  Govan Depot used to have the reputation of being haunted by a ghostly figure which seemed to like to climb into the driving cabs of the Subway cars. Obviously a stranger in such a place had to be investigated, but, try as they might, the night workers could never actually catch him at it because, just like the previous gentleman with the raincoat and flat cap, he simply evaporated. However, when his pursuers entered the driver’s cab where he had been spotted, they always found it empty and much, much colder than its surroundings. Icily and unnaturally so.

  Other unexplained phenomena on the Glasgow Subway include mysterious noises like the repeated sound of a hammer hitting a rail between St Enoch and Bridge Street stations when maintenance work was being done at night. Also there used to be what are described as singing noises, for all the world like a female choir, heard by night-time cleaners working in the tunnels between Kelvinbridge and Hillhead stations where the line is quite deep underground.

  Pinwherry

  Pinwherry is a wayside station on the long secondary main line from Girvan to Stranraer. The line was built by the Girvan & Portpatrick Railway and opened in 1870. It met the Portpatrick & Wigtownshire joint line from Dumfries at Challoch Junction and had running powers over its line through Stranraer to Portpatrick.

  Shields Road Station at platform level. This is an ill-frequented station on the ‘Clockwork Orange’, Glasgow’s subway system.

  A story, amusing rather than paranormal, is told about Pinwherry. One night an exceptionally heavy southbound freight train was scheduled from Girvan to Stranraer. The only locomotive available was a small and underpowered one. It was obvious that it could not tackle the 1 in 54 gradient of Glendoune Bank with the whole train so a decision was taken to divide the train and take half as far as Pinmore. The locomotive would then return to Girvan and hook up with the second half of the train, bring it to Pinmore where the two halves could be united and taken over the easier gradients on to Stranraer. The first section was worked through to Pinmore and the locomotive detached as planned. However, before the brakes on the wagons could be pinned down, they began to move down the incline they had just come up, gathering speed as they went. Luckily there were no other trains expected as these wagons almost joyfully rushed down through Pinwherry. The station there was in a dip after which the line climbed towards Girvan. This gradient slowed them down and they eventually halted for a second before gravity took over and back they hurtled through Pinwherry once more. They continued to roll to and fro at least six times, slowly losing momentum before coming to a rest close to Pinwherry Station. A permanent way inspector was lodging for the night in the stationmaster’s house and at breakfast next morning he was rather grumpy. He had hardly had a wink all night, he said, because trains were hurtling through the station every few minutes. Never, he stated, in over twenty years service on the railways, had he ever known such a busy country station. It’s just as well he didn’t look out of the window or he may well have seen a ghost train with wagons but no locomotive rushing past.

  Pinwherry; the scene of a restless night for the inspector staying in the station house.

  The line from Girvan to Stranraer is still operational. At Pinmore, incidentally, the ghost of a woman who threw herself under a train has been seen from time to time.

  The Tay Bridge

  The River Tay has its source in a corrie on the slopes of Ben Lui in the Grampians, and it flows 110 miles to pass Dundee and enter the sea. Dundee had become a major industrial centre by the nineteenth century, but it was finding the Firth of Tay a formidable natural barrier to the development of its industries, the famous ‘three J’s’ – jute, jam and journalism. Until the 1860s the received wisdom was that the Firth was so wide that there was no possibility of a bridge being built across it in the vicinity of Dundee.

  That there was a need for a bridge across the Tay cannot be denied. To journey the mere forty-six miles from Edinburgh involved the traveller having a strong stomach, a stoical lack of imagination and plenty of time; well over three hours or more when there were any of the frequent storms on the Forth and the Tay. From Edinburgh Waverley the train trundled the short distance to Granton where the passengers boarded a ferry and lurched dyspeptically across the Forth to Burntisland. There a train waited to take them to Newport on the south side of the Tay where the woebegone travellers embarked on a second ferry and crossed the Firth to Broughty Ferry from where yet a third train waited to take them the short distance to Dundee.

  The prize for the railway company that built a bridge across the Tay would be a rich one and the benefits for Dundonians would be enormous. A bridge would need to be two miles long, and no bridge on this scale had ever been built. It would be an object of enormous pride for the citizens of Dundee, giving the city the direct route to the south that it desperately needed and thereby putting the city firmly on the national map. The North British Railway Co. decided to grasp the nettle and they engaged Thomas Bouch, an experienced builder of railway structures, as its engineer. Work started on 22 July 1871. To ensure sufficient headroom for shipping on the Tay, the rails would pass through the most elevated central part of the bridge in what became known as the ‘High Girders’. On the rest of the bridge the rails would run along the top of box girders.

  As the bridge began to take shape, distinguished visitors came to gaze at this new wonder of the world. These included the old King of Brazil who got so carried away
that he argued for a similar but somewhat longer bridge to be built across the mouth of the Amazon! Prince Leopold of Prussia was another royal, but the most popular celebrity seems to have been General Ulysses Simpson Grant, eighteenth President of the USA and a hero of the Union Army. His nickname was ‘Old Glory’, and the crowds gave him a marvellous reception, but despite his swashbuckling reputation it soon became obvious that whenever he was asked a question it was always his wife who answered it. The only time he managed to forestall her was when he was canvassed for his opinion of the bridge. ‘It’s a very long bridge,’ he said. This rather dull statement accorded with the generally accepted view that Grant was the strong and silent sort, but it still elicited a cheer from the crowd if only because it was the first time any of them had actually heard the general speak.

  The first train to cross this prodigious bridge was a ‘directors’ special’ which did so on 26 September 1877. The bridge still had to undergo examination by an inspecting officer from the Royal Engineers on behalf of the Board of Trade before it could be passed as fit to carry fare-paying passengers. The inspector was the very model of a modern major-general by the name of Charles Scrope Hutchinson. He was a meticulous and incorruptible man who spent three days examining the bridge minutely, walking it from end to end, travelling over it on a special train, poking about under it in a boat and even surveying it from a distance with a telescope and finally a theodolite. He passed the bridge as fit for public use with the proviso of a speed limit of 25mph. He added what in retrospect was an ominous rider to his report. These were his words: ‘I should wish, if possible, to have an opportunity of observing the effects of a high wind when a train of carriages is running over the bridge.’