One man dead, the other alive in month darkened by two tragedies
TWO terrible events dominated the Herald's news pages in May 1915 — the Gretna Rail Disaster and the torpedoing of the Lusitania.
The Herald said the sinking of the Cunard liner off the Irish coast with the loss of 1457 of the 2160 people on board, had ''caused a tremendous sensation throughout the entire world as the latest example of German 'frightfulness'', and it is everywhere condemned as an outrage of a most heinous nature, and contrary to all international law.
''Like many other places, Milngavie has not escaped interest in the dastardly crime, and we publish accounts of two persons well known locally who have lost their lives.''
One of these was Mrs T.O. Osborne, who had moved from Milngavie the previous year to live at Broomhill. She was returning from America after visiting her husband, who was chief steward on board another vessel.
The paper also reported that John Fenwick, whose brother was a member of Milngavie Town Council, was among those who perished. It added that John Fenwick had attended Milngavie Public School and his family was ''one of the best known and highly respected in Milngavie and district.'' He had emigrated some 20 years before to Switzerland where he joined another brother's embroidery manufacturing firm. He had boarded the Lusitania for his usual May business trip to America.
''He was a great favourite, and held in high esteem by all who knew him in Milngavie,'' said the Herald.
The Herald the following week reported that the Rev Norman MacLeod Caie, former minister of New Kilpatrick Parish Church, by then at Pollockshields, had spoken of the atrocity in his sermon.
He said Germany, the land of the great reformer Martin Luther, had shaken off its fine Christian heritage and fallen into wicked ways. The German soul was empty, he said, a vacuum which by the laws of nature and scripture could not long remain so. He said something diabolical had taken up residence in the German consciousness.
''From a German golden age, good Lord deliver us!,'' he declared.
''The concrete examples of Germany's spiritual fall are not far to seek,'' he told his parishioners. ''Both on land and sea she had committed wrongs and crimes darker than those of savages and dervishes. The world has been shocked beyond description at the dastardly sinking of our noble liner, the Lusitania, the ship which Glasgow built and was so justly proud of.
''With her precious cargo and her hundreds of unoffending and defenceless lives she has gone to the bottom through the action of coward German torpedoes. And the whole world stands today aghast. Surely the demons are diabolically busy in the empty German house!''
By this time many people had lost loved ones at the Front and others were beginning to prepare themselves for the possibility of bad news.
But nothing could have prepared people for the shocking loss of more than 160 fighting men before they even reached the trenches.
That is what happened when a contingent of the 1st Battallion of the 7th Royal Scots, en route for the front, was involved in a triple train crash at Gretna.
Their train, and a London to Glasgow sleeper, both slammed into a local train.
''The results of the accident were appalling,'' said the Herald. ''Not only were there two distinct collissions, in which in each case the oncoming train was travelling at full speed, but the plight of the passengers was rendered perilous in the extreme by an immediate outbreak of fire.
''Many of the passengers must have been killed outright, but the fate of others was less merciful. Imprisoned in the interlocked carriages, scores of them were either burned to death or suffered terrible injuries from the flames before they were rescued.''
One of the survivors was 20-year-old Lieutenant Purvis Kirsop from Bearsden, who was travelling home on leave on the London to Glasgow sleeper. His three companions died, but the Herald said that Lt Kirsop of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders had a ''remarkable escape''.
He fell through the floor of his sleeping compartment and found himself lying on the rails, pinned between two mattresses. ''He had to be cut out of the wood which held him prisoner and he was thankful to escape,'' said the Herald.
After hospital treatment for back pains and shock, he was taken home by ambulance to Bearsden.
The overall death toll from the triple crash was 227. The disaster was blamed on a signalling error.
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Saturday 11 February 2012
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