Last Updated on April 23, 2026
This fascinating collection of entertaining tales from as far afield as Europe, India and America reveals unusual and unconventional railway journeys across the centuries, including ghost trains, vanishing passengers and trains fitted with homing pigeons instead of a communication cord. There are eccentric lords, who transferred carriages complete with horses and footmen onto the train, and the drivers who stole garden fencing to keep up a good head of steam.
You’ll also discover characters such as the soot-bag men, who were employed to look as messy as possible to prevent the wealthy from buying cheap third-class tickets. Railways” Strangest Journeys takes you on a journey from the dawn of railway travel, when speeds of fifteen miles an hour were considered blasphemous and damaging to one’s internal organs, through the Victorian heyday of Royal Trains and seaside specials, right up to the modern day.
Journalist Tom Quinn spends much of his time travelling around Britain looking for quirky subjects to write about.
His fifteen books to date cover everything from antique collecting and walking to English eccentrics. He writes occasional obituaries for The Times and edits Country Landowner magazine. Tom Quinn is the author of Shooting’s Strangest Days and Fishing’s Strangest Days (also published by Robson Books).
This book was previously for sale at Margot’s Books. The shop is now closed — this post is kept as an archive record only.
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