Denaby Man Killed – Thought Oncoming Car Was Bus

August 1940

Mexborough & Swinton Times August 03

Denaby Man Killed

Thought Oncoming Car Was Bus

An inquest was held at the Doncaster Guild Hall on Wednesday by the Doncaster Coroner, Mr. W. H. Carlile, on George Dixon (63), a colliery contractor of Sprotborough Street, Denaby, who was fatally injured on the Sheffield Road, at Warmsworth, on Saturday night when knocked down by a motor car

A verdict of “Accidental Death” was returned.

The widow Minnie Dixon said she and her husband and a friend, Mrs. Knowles, of Edlington Street, Denaby, were waiting for a bus at Warmsworth. She and Mrs. Knowles had got on the grass verge and her husband had one foot on the kerb and the other in the gutter when he was struck by a car. He was standing there in order to signal the bus.

Phyllis Mary Barker, Moorgate Hall, Rotherham, a passenger in the car, said it was travelling about 20 to 25 miles an hour. “I saw three people in the road”, she said, “They were five yards away when I first saw them,. The driver braked and swerved but he could not swerve far enough because there was a bus almost on top of them”.

Alfred Leedle, a Doncaster Corporation bus driver, who was travelling to Doncaster, said he formed the opinion that two of the pedestrians were in the roadway.

Flight Lieutenant Holmes Strabane, Calver Road, Baslow, the driver of the car, said there were three people in his section of the road about five yards away. They were wearing dark clothing and a combination of circumstances prevented him seeing them before he did. There were a number of approaching vehicles and he did what he could to avoid the pedestrians.

The Coroner said the driver of the car appeared to have been travelling at a reasonable speed. Everyone knew how difficult it was travelling under blackout conditions especially when people stood in front of a vehicle with dark clothes on a dark background.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.