Railway Adventures and Anecdotes: Extending over More Than Fifty Years
History
Railway Adventures and Anecdotes: Extending over More Than Fifty Years
Railroads
It was Lord Wilton who suggested the removal of Mr. Huskisson to Eccles
Vicarage and improvised a tourniquet on the spot, while soon the medical
men who were in the train did what they could for him. Mr. Blackburne,
as will be remembered, was not with his wife, and only the presentiment
which had brought Mrs. Blackburne home had given the means of so readily
and quickly obtaining surgical necessaries and rest. Mr. Blackburne,
writing to his mother-in-law the day after this accident, referring to
Mr. Huskisson, remarks:—“To the last he retained his senses. Lord
Granville says when the dying man heard Wilton propose to take him to
this house he exclaimed, ‘Pray take me there; there I shall indeed be
taken care of.’
But fancy my horror! _Not one word did I know of his being here till I
had passed the place_, _and was literally eating my luncheon at
Manchester_! In vain did I try to get a conveyance, till at last the
Duke of Wellington sent to me and ordered his car to start, and I came
with him back, he intending to come here; but the crowd was so _immense_
that the police dared not let him get out. To be sure, when my people on
the bridge saw me standing with him, they did shout, ‘That’s as it should
be—Vicar for us!’ He said, ‘These people seem to know you well.’
_Entre nous_, at the door I met my love, and after a good cry (I don’t
know which was the greatest fool!) set to work. The poor fellow was glad
to see me, and never shall I forget the scene, his poor wife holding his
head, and the great men weeping, for they all wept! He then received the
Sacrament, added some codocils to his will, and seemed perfectly
resigned. But his agonies were dreadful! Ransome says they must have
been so. He expired at nine. We never left him till he breathed his
last. Poor woman! How she lamented his loss; yet her struggles to bear
with fortitude are wonderful. I wish you could have heard him exclaim,
after my petition ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive . . . ’ ‘I
have not the smallest ill-will to any one person in the whole world.’
They stay here until Saturday, when they begin the sad journey to convey
him to Sussex. They wanted to bury him at Liverpool, but she refused. I
forgot to tell you that he told Lawrence before starting that he _wished
he were safe back_.”
Mr. Huskisson was not buried at Chichester, for at last Mrs. Huskisson
consented to the popular wish that his body might have a public funeral
at Liverpool, where a statue of him by Gibson now stands in the
cemetery.”
ELEVATED SIGHT-SEERS WISHING TO DESCEND.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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