Train crash tragedy at Quintinshill that has shaped a family’s history for 100 years

The stories of drummer-boy John’s death and Peter’s survival are part of the family history of former Scottish Labour leader and East Lothian MSP Iain Gray.

Private Peter Cumming was asleep when his troop train crashed into a stationary passenger coach just outside Gretna.

He tried to scramble out but was thrown to the floor again when an express from London ploughed into the derailed gas-lit wooden train.

The sparks from the collision ignited an inferno which would ultimately claim the lives of 216 men, the worst rail disaster Britain has ever seen. But the 15-year-old, the youngest soldier on board, clambered out and searched the twisted wreckage and fierce flames for his brother John.

He found him badly injured and although he did get to hospital, 17-year-old John, from Albert Street in Leith, would the next day become another of the 7th Royal Scots who died in the tragedy.

The events at Quintinshill on May 22, 1915 touched the lives of nearly every family in the port of Leith. If they did not lose a loved one, they were probably left to care for one of the 246 who were injured.

However the stories of drummer-boy John’s death and Peter’s survival are part of the family history of former Scottish Labour leader and East Lothian MSP Iain Gray.

He and his 87-year-old mother Rena have been piecing together what happened to her uncles, elder brothers of her father George, as the 100th anniversary of the disaster nears.

“Peter had joined the Territorials because you could do that when you were 14,” says Rena, who now lives in Blackhall, Edinburgh. “John was already with them, and when they were asked to join the Royal Scots he was of the right age. Peter wasn’t, so he lied about how old he was.

“He was the youngest there and should never have even been on the train. His father, my grandad John Cumming, was also in the Royal Scots, and he was on the train behind, with Peter’s birth certificate, as he didn’t want him to go to war.”

She adds: “It was amazing he survived. Perhaps it was because he was sleeping. He found John and got him medical help and managed to send a telegram home. It read: ‘John hurt father not on train myself safe, Peter’.

“But John died the following day and we think he might have been the youngest to die. And Peter didn’t get sent home. He went out to the Dardanelles and managed to survive that and even won a Military Medal. He came home from the war and was a policeman in Liverpool the rest of his days, never really speaking about what happened that day.

“He did once tell me that he never fell asleep on a train again.”

The appalling Quintinshill tragedy which snuffed out the lives of the young men of Leith before they ever faced the enemy, took place on a clear morning near Gretna. Troops from Leith and a few from Falkirk had boarded at Larbert, full of a desire to fight for their country as they headed for Liverpool, their final destination before Gallipoli.

But at 6.49 am they hit an empty passenger train which had been mistakenly shunted on to the line by signalmen George Meakin and James Tinsley both would later be found guilty of culpable homicide. The express from London to Glasgow was told too late of the accident and crashed head-on into the wreckage.

The disaster is remembered in a BBC2 Scotland documentary on Wednesday, in which it’s claimed some soldiers were shot as their injuries were too severe to survive. The army has always denied the “mercy killings” happened.

But Colonel Robert Watson, one of the most senior veterans of the Royal Scots, has told the makers of Quintinshill: Britain’s Deadliest Rail Disaster, the shootings “probably” did happen.

Remembering the disaster forms a major part of the Scottish Government’s First World War commemoration events.

The old drill hall in Leith’s Dalmeny Street where the Territorials trained, will hold an exhibition about the disaster. The Lady Haig Poppy Factory is also creating a unique wreath.

Iain Gray says: “This has always been a bit of family history but it’s only recently we’ve discovered more of the details. My mum remembers Peter and her grandad but there was very little said about John’s death or what any of them went through.

“So many families in the same place lost someone that day, or in the war, it was as though it was something to get on with rather than dwell on. But Peter’s story is incredible. There were hundreds of acts of heroism which have been forgotten, but we know he got John to hospital, even if in the end it was too late.

“To be so young and to survive the crash, then to survive the war . . . he was so lucky. Especially as Albert Street suffered the most losses.”

John’s body came home to Leith and was buried in Seafield cemetery and his name is on the memorial monument in Leith’s Rosebank cemetery. There are also memorials in Larbert and Gretna.

Rena adds: “The Clan Cumming’s motto is ‘Courage’. I think Peter certainly showed it that day. Peter used to come to Rosebank every year on the anniversary of the crash until he was the last one left.

“I’m so glad those who died are being remembered.”

Timeline of a tragedy Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

3.45 am – Liverpool-bound train carrying 470 recruits from the 7th Battalion, Royal Scots Guards, departs Larbert.

4.50 am Empty goods train from Carlisle is moved on to loop line at Quintinshill.

6.17 am Local Carlisle train leaves earlier than scheduled.

6.32 am Local passenger train from Carlisle is shunted on to line in an attempt to let late-running express trains pass.

6.34 am Coal wagon returning to Wales from Grangemouth is moved on to loop at Quintinshill heading to Carlisle.

6.47 am London to Glasgow express, packed with holidaymakers and soldiers going on leave, leaves Carlisle.

6.49 am Troop train collides head-on with Carlisle passenger train.

6.50 am Express from London crashes into the wreckage.