Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer

Alma Mock-Yen and Merrick Needham in conversation at the launch of the book 'Reaper of Souls' by Beverley East, held at the Undercroft, University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, on Saturday, September 1. - Winston Sill/Freelance Photographer

Fifty years to the day after the Kendal train disaster, which happened when a train derailed near the Manchester village, Beverley East presented Reaper of Souls, a book with fictional characters based on the actual history of the accident, at the Undercroft, University of the West Indies, Mona Campus, on Saturday evening.

East's fiction was supported by the memory of Merrick Needham, former RJR programmes manager, who reported on the accident and who described seeinga field of about one and a half acres "filled with the parts of bodies, a finger here, an ankle, a head. They had rolled down from the carriages".

Full circle

East

At the time it was the second worst train disaster in history.

Apart from the sheer magnitude of the disaster it was also a very personal matter for East, who told the large audience gathered at the Undercroft that, "I did a lot of crying in the writing of the book, so I will try not to do any crying today. I do not know if this is the beginning of my journey, but I know it is not the end.

"When I started writing someone told me I could not do it: 'You are an English girl, what do you know about Jamaica?'" East said she was asked. That, of course, provided added reason for her to write Reaper of Souls and East said, "I feel as if I have come full circle".

After thanking many relatives, East said: "When I started doing this I did not realise how difficult it was going to be". Still, there was no point at which she considered giving up.

On thanking Michael Grant of Great House, which published Reaper of Souls, East said: "I don't think I am the easiest person to work with.

"The characters are fictional, but most of the facts from Kendal I think are accurate," East stated. "A lot of survivors I met, I incorpo-rated their stories into my characters' voices."

Grant thanked East for taking the project to Great House, as "there are other, more well-known publishing houses, that could have published the book". He thanked Warren Field for the cover design and said Reaper of Souls is "a wonderful piece of art".

There was laughter when Fae Ellington, who hosted the launch, referred to the glitches in the sound which haunted the event with, "this duppy thing serious", quipping about salt over the shoulder while making the appropriate movement.

Alma Mock-Yen said that her ex-husband and his two brothers were on the ill-fatedtrain, but the power supply problems put paid to the radio documentary which she should have introduced.

Needham made it clear that it was hooligans on the train who messed with the brakes that caused the accident. "It was bad behaviour, if you like, that led to the disaster," he said.

He said that press coverage was limited to himself and whoever was there from The Gleaner and described the scene as "an appalling mess of splintered wooden coaches and body parts".

Needham said that initially the number of dead persons was reported at 300, then it was revised to 200 and today it stands at about 170, while the reports of injury were similarly reduced from over 1,000 persons to an estimate of 400 to 700.

He said that personnel at the British Military Hospital (now the Bustamante Children's Hospital) "gave invaluable help to the Jamaican health authorities" and informed the gathering that at one point there was a military railway service between Port Royal in Kingston and Rocky Point in Clarendon.

And there was a voice that has also gone, as a 1960, RJR 10-year anniversary clip of Neville Willoughby recounting the disaster was played. Charmaine Limonius on vocals and guitar, along with Dike Rostant on percussions, delivered an excellent rendition of People Get Ready.

Winston Oliver, who had been on the train, did not turn up as scheduled, but Ellington said that he rescued his then girlfriend, to whom he is now married. And Professor Carolyn Cooper, as well as Ellington, read excerpts from Reaper of Souls before East did book signing duties.

The 1957 Kendal crash.