Strange Happenings At Beal Station In 1867

Introduction

Following my latest blog at Borders Ancestry, I was contacted by Valerie Glass who is a regular follower and contributor of #AncestryHour.  You will probably know her as @NthHist or @BDHHM (Belford and District Hidden History Museum). Valerie wondered if this fabulous tale from a bygone era would be of interest to our followers.  Personally I think it is little gem, and just the sort of detail that adds colour and personality to our research.  The article first appeared in The Friends of Berwick and District Museum and Archives Newsletter, September Issue 2009.

Strange Happenings At Beal Station In 1867

Beal Station. Photo Courtesy of WIKI Commons

As a child growing up in the 1950’s I heard from my grandfather the story of his uncle, John Redpath, who ran off to America in 1867 and who, in doing so, “broke his mother’s heart”. The adventurer returned to Northumberland, over 50 years later, having survived various vicissitudes of fortune during the intervening years, eventually making his fortune as owner of an iron foundry in McAlester, Oklahoma, USA. We had a few mementoes of him at home, photographs of him with his son, both in Free Mason’s dress, a photograph of him with his younger sister, Eliza (only 8 years old when he left Northumberland) on his return in 1922 and a magnificent pipe sent as a present to my grandfather. Sadly by the time I heard the story all contact with our American cousins had been lost. 

But what fascinated me most about the story was the fact that John had not told his parents about his intended departure and made his getaway on the train south from Berwick. As it passed through Beal Station he had thrown a note onto the platform bidding farewell to his parents and siblings. That was the first they knew of his plans. This is where the story becomes confused. The note was wrapped around a stone or was it a potato……? A stone seemed more practical but I was sure my grandfather had mentioned a potato! Years later when browsing through a magazine I read that cutting a slice into a potato and wedging a note inside it was a common method of sending a message from a train in the early days of rail travel. It seems remarkable today that a young man setting off on such an adventure should rely on what seems such a dubious way of communicating. His parents at that time lived at Fenwick Granary a few miles away. However, the note must have reached them for the story had come down to me 100 years later. In the meantime the vision of young 22 John Redpath setting out for America and casting the note onto the railway platform at Beal Station remained vivid in my mind. 

Some years later, when I had embarked on researching my family history in earnest, the mystery of how the note reached John’s parents was solved. I discovered through the census returns that his maternal grandparents, John and Mary Suthern, were living at Beal Station at the time of his departure. The note must have been passed to them and then on to their daughter (John’s mother) at Fenwick Granary, a few miles down the road.

What is more, I also discovered from my American cousins whom I managed to contact through an advert in an Oklahoman newspaper, that John had been employed as a railway guard before his departure. So he could have a good knowledge of the speed of trains passing through Beal and how to take aim with his stone/potato! So far none of the American side seems to have heard the story of the railway platform. I suppose it made a much greater impression upon the relatives he left behind in Northumberland whereas John himself would quickly forget the incident in the excitement of the adventures which lay ahead of him; he survived a 6 week voyage across the Atlantic to disembark in Philadelphia and went on to work for the Union Pacific railway, being present at the Golden Spike ceremony when the railway tracks from the East and west Coasts were joined together. I have seen a photograph of this with numerous railway workers included but it is not clear enough to attempt identification. He married a young woman of Durham-born immigrants shortly after his arrival in America and produced a family of 11. Amazingly it was from my American relatives that I learnt where John’s parents (my great greatgrandparents) are buried! I am sure there is more to find out about my illustrious railway ancestor!

​Valerie Glass

You can follow Valerie and find out all that is happening with the North Northumberland Family History Society @NthHist with more information at:
http://www.ndfhs.org.uk/branches/north-northumberland/

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