The Great Western Railway's accident record has always been a good one, as they were a safety conscious Company and instilled this into their staff. It is not surprising, therefore, that the accidents on the line were few and far between. It seems that most problems occurred at the footpath crossings of which there were many between Chalford and Stonehouse. Both Brimscombe and Stroud received footbridges to prevent such accidents.
Charles Richardson, the lines engineer, prepared a paper on "Presence of mind" detailing incidents in which people became mesmerised when crossing tracks and finding trains looming down on them. The first he recalls was a railway policeman who was controlling Purton embankment slip, but he was fortunate enough to jump clear at the last moment. A carpenter who walked over a boarded crossing at Brimscombe, before the days of the footbridge, found himself facing an up express. Despite the efforts of a ticket collector who tried to save him, the engine struck the carpenter and he was killed, although he had time to have walked over the crossing several times in safety. A similar fate happened to a woman at Stroud. She too became fascinated while walking over the level crossing and died as her niece looked on.
Richardson also describes the near fate of the Chalford permanent way inspector, David Jones, who had the habit of crossing to the other line if he saw a train approaching him. This almost cost him his life when he was caught by a train on the other line.
There was, of course, the incident at Standish Junction in 1848 when a Midland express collided with a Great Western goods train, the GWR claiming it was the Midland's driver's fault, until evidence was taken from the signalman. A collision occurred at Brimscombe on the 8th July 1851 when thirteen coaches of an excursion train broke loose and ran back into the path of the on-coming mail. The mail's driver had the presence of mind to reverse his train and soften the impact. As a result of this the Board of Trade Inspector suggested that telegraph be installed between Sapperton and Brimscombe.
In l952 a collision occurred at Gloucester Central station. A passenger train was correctly admitted the occupied main platform by a calling-on signal, but the driver who was working into the station for the first time and in sole charge, misjudged the stop and some of the passengers in the rear coach of 6the standing train were injured in the resulting collision. The coach was a 3rd brake and was incorrectly marshalled with the passenger compartment in the rear.
In the autumn of 1961 two evening goods trains were derailed at Brimscombe, scattering their trucks across the tracks and closing the line. It appears that a wagon became derailed and was hit by the on-coming goods train.
A passenger train overshot the buffers at Nailsworth station in l871 and ploughed into a pile of coal, and on the Midland line to Bristol there was a serious disaster at Charfield in October1928 when a Bristol bound express ran through signals. Fifteen people were killed. a similar occurrence happened on the Gloucester to Birmingham line at Ashchurch in January 1929 when four people were killed. Fortunately no accidents like these did not occur on the Cheltenham and Great Western Union's tracks.
