Wetheral train accident 1836

The Wetheral train accident occurred in England at about 4pm on Saturday 3 December 1836 when a passenger train on the Newcastle and Carlisle Railway was wrongly diverted into a siding at Wetheral, a village close to Carlisle, Cumbria. The train derailed and crushed three people to death.

The Newcastle & Carlisle Railway opened in sections from March 1835, with the whole line opening to passengers on 18 June 1838. Lord Carlisle owned extensive coal-mining interests in Cumberland and had built and operated the Brampton Railway connecting his coal mines from the late 1700s. The new Newcastle and Carlisle Railway crossed and connected with the Brampton Railway at Brampton Junction.

Six or eight miles westwards along the Newcastle and Carlisle Railway from Brampton Junction is the village of Wetheral and a few hundred yards before Wetheral railway station is the hamlet of Great Corby. At Great Corby there was a siding owned by Lord Carlisle that led to coal staithes (where the track was supported above ground level to allow easy transfer of coal from rail wagons into road wagons). The siding was entered from the Brampton Junction (i.e. Newcastle) direction and when travelling from that direction there is quite a steep gradient down to the siding. The operation of the point for the siding was the responsibility of an employee of Lord Carlisle (and not the railway company), and part of the responsibility was to make sure the point was left set for the main line, not the siding, once trains had passed onto and away from the siding.

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