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Off the Rails by Beryl Kingston (view source)
Revision as of 15:41, 10 January 2012
, 15:41, 10 January 2012no edit summary
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A young girl from a Yorkshire village was weeping, begging her mother to be allowed just one more night at home, but the carter was waiting for her. The girl was fifteen, unmarried and pregnant. She was to go any and stay with her aunt until the baby was born and she would be Mrs Smith whose husband had died at sea. The father of the baby was actually a village boy, George Hudson, who would prefer to pay a fine for bastardy than make an honest woman of the girl. He too ended up leaving home over the matter. In the years to come the paths of Jane, along with her daughter Milly, would cross and recross with Jane swearing that she would have vengeance.
Just about two centuries on we remember George Hudson as the Railway King. Living in York, where he had dragged himself up from nothing by any means possible, he was responsible for bringing railways to most of the country. He became fabulously wealthy, obese and deeply unpleasant - and he would get his comeuppance. All this is true and Beryl Kingston has seamlessly woven her story of Jane and Milly - and the people they would meet and love - into the far less pleasant story of George Hudson and it's very difficult to see where truth ends and fiction begins.