Between 6 and 7 a.m. on November 5 the General was on the platform of Nagpur Station awaiting the arrival of the train, when a telegraphic message came in, saying that there had been a serious railway accident to the Chief's train about nine miles away. A message was sent back for medical assistance, and as soon as possible a break-down gang was got together, but it was nearly 11 o'clock before the relief train reached the spot. General John tells us that the sight that greeted him was more shocking than any battlefield. Eight men of the North Lancashire Regiment were killed outright, twenty-four were severely injured; a European guard, both drivers and both firemen were killed; five native passengers were also killed and eight wounded. Beyond this total of eighteen deaths, four soldiers died within the next few days in hospital. The framework of the carriages, the iron rails, and the men's rifles--everything was amazingly crumpled up and distorted. The permanent way at this spot runs along a thirty-foot embankment. The whole train was derailed, both engines with their tenders, a horse-box, and five or six coaches had rolled {105} to the bottom of the slope; the next carriage, in which Sir George Greaves had been travelling, was suspended half-way down the bank at an angle of 45°, the body having been completely wrenched away from the platform; and the last coach, which had been occupied by the staff officers--Gatacre, Hogg, and Leach--was hanging in the most precarious position over the edge. It turned out that the train was unusually long and heavy that day, as it was bringing some fifty men of the North Lancashire Regiment back from Chi-Kulda, a civil hill-station in the Berars, where a few sickly men had been sent as an experiment. When the railway officials at Budnari Junction found that the three coaches set aside for the use of the Headquarter Staff had also to be attached, they feared that the engine would not be powerful enough to pull the train up a certain incline, and gave directions that a spare engine (which was meant only for local shunting work) should be put on in front. This supplementary engine was the cause of the misfortune, for the tyres of its wheels, having been mended, gave way under the unusual strain of a long journey. The front engine left the metals, and, rolling over, pulled the whole train along with it.