The Day Everything Changed

As told by Constance Annie Carson (later Caddy)

I’ve never thought of myself as a creative writer—certainly not one who writes fiction. But in researching my family history, I often find myself wondering how things might have felt for the people whose lives I’m piecing together. This story is an experiment: a first-person narrative told in the voice of my great-grandmother, Constance Annie Carson, drawing from known facts and census records, filled in with imagined thoughts, feelings, and moments. I’ve used AI to help shape this narrative, taking me well outside my comfort zone. However, I wanted to give it a try—to step into her shoes, even if just for a moment, and see the world through her eyes.

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Constance Annie Carson (1861-1941)

I was twelve years old when my world fell apart, though I didn't understand it properly at first. Children never do, do they? We live inside such a small world—our house on Green Lane, the sound of Father's boots on the cobbles, the ever-present smell of paint and turpentine that always clung to his clothes.

It was a Saturday morning in early September 1873, in our little house on Green Lane in Derby. I remember, because Mary was helping Mother with the weekly washing and little Florence was playing with her rag doll by the kitchen fire. I was supposed to be practicing my letters, but I kept watching the road through our front window instead. Something felt different that morning, though I couldn't say what.

The first sign came with the sound of hooves—urgent, not the usual clip-clop of the milk cart or the doctor's gentle mare. Uncle Henry's horse was lathered with sweat, and when he dismounted, his face was grey as ash. I'd never seen Uncle Henry look anything but cheerful before. He was Father's younger brother, always quick with a joke or a penny sweet for us girls. But that morning, he moved like an old man.

Mother must have seen him from the kitchen window because she came out wiping her hands on her apron, her face already tight with worry. "Henry?" she called. "What brings you out so early?"

I pressed my nose to the glass, straining to hear. Uncle Henry took off his hat—I remember that clearly, how he turned it round and round in his hands like he was trying to find the right words somewhere in its brim. When he spoke, his voice was so low I couldn't make out the words, but I saw Mother's face change. The colour drained right out of it, and she pressed both hands to her mouth.

Then came the sound I'll never forget—Mother's cry. Not a scream, but something deeper, more terrible. It came from some place inside her that I didn't know existed. Mary dropped the washing and ran outside, her skirts dripping soapy water. I should have stayed inside with Florence, should have protected her from what was coming, but I was only twelve myself. I followed Mary out into the yard.

"There's been an accident," Uncle Henry was saying, his voice thick. "At Hendon station. John... your father..." He couldn't finish, but he didn't need to. Something in Mother's keening told us everything.

Mary, being fifteen and thinking herself nearly grown, tried to take charge. "How?" she demanded, her voice sharp with disbelief. "Father's always so careful. He knows those railway lines better than anyone."

Uncle Henry's hands shook as he explained what had happened. Father had been working on the great London Extension—that magnificent line the Midland Railway had been building since before I was born, stretching all the way from Derby to the grand new St. Pancras station in London. The company relied on skilled men like Father to inspect and maintain their work, especially around the newer stations. I learned later that Hendon had only opened five years earlier, in 1868, when the Extension was completed. Father had been involved from the beginning.

"He was walking the permanent way—along the tracks—checking the paintwork on the station buildings at Hendon,” Uncle Henry said. “You know how particular the company is about their stations looking proper."

I did know. Father often spoke with pride about the Midland's reputation for having the finest stations and the most elegant carriages of any railway company.

But that Friday afternoon, as Father walked between the platforms, the express from Derby to London came thundering through without stopping. Hendon was one of those intermediate stations where the fast trains didn’t pause—they roared straight through at tremendous speed, carrying businessmen and fine ladies from the Midlands down to the capital. The driver would have had no reason to expect anyone on the tracks.

Uncle Henry couldn't finish telling us the rest, but I learned later from whispered conversations that the locomotive had struck Father and flung him thirty yards before the entire train—engine, tender, and all those heavy carriages—had passed over him. They’d asked Uncle Henry to come down from Derby to identify what remained, a journey that must have seemed endless on that very same railway line that had claimed his brother’s life.

Florence appeared in the doorway, still clutching her doll, her eyes wide with confusion. "Why is Mama crying?" she asked me. She was only ten, still young enough to believe that tears could be kissed away and broken things could always be mended.

I remember thinking how unfair it was that I had to be the one to tell her. At twelve, I was caught between childhood and something harder—old enough to understand death, too young to know how to carry it.

The neighbours came quickly after that. News travels fast in a village like Ockbrook, especially shocking news like ours. Our village might have been growing—what with the Midland Counties Railway running right through Borrowash and the cotton mills on the Derwent providing work—but it was still small enough that everyone knew everyone else's business.

Mrs. Anthony from next door arrived first, still wearing her flour-dusted apron from baking day. She took charge of our kitchen with the efficiency of a woman who’d done this before—and in those days, most women had. Mrs. Henry appeared with a tureen of soup, though none of us could manage to eat. The rector’s wife came bearing black ribbons and gentle words about God’s mysterious ways that only made Mother cry harder.

Even Mrs. Orchard from the Moravian settlement walked down from the red-brick buildings near the chapel to offer her condolences. The Moravians were particular about keeping to themselves mostly, but death was one of those occasions when the whole community came together, regardless of which church you attended. Their quiet, disciplined ways of worship were different from ours, but they understood grief just the same.

What struck me most was how the women moved around our house like they’d done this before—and of course they had. Death was a frequent visitor in those days. They knew the steps of this terrible dance: draw the curtains, stop the clocks, cover the mirrors. I watched them transform our cheerful home into something dark and foreign.

"Your father was a good man," Uncle Henry told us, his voice steady in a way that Mother's wasn't. "He worked hard, loved his family, and took pride in his craft."

But Mother... Mother was drowning. In the days that followed, I watched her try to hold us all together while falling apart herself. She’d sit at Father’s desk, surrounded by papers she couldn’t read properly—contracts with the Railway Company, bills, accounts. Her hands would shake as she tried to make sense of numbers that had always been Father’s concern.

"What will we do?" I heard her whisper to Mrs. Anthony one afternoon when she thought we girls were napping. "I can’t keep the house without John’s wages. I don’t know how to manage any of this."

Mrs. Anthony’s reply was practical, as such conversations always were among women of our class: "You’ll take in sewing, Anne. You’ve always been handy with a needle. The girls can help—Mary’s old enough to find work as a housemaid. You’ll manage because you must."

The funeral was held three days later at All Saints. I’d never been to a funeral before, and everything about it seemed designed to make grief bigger, more terrible. The black clothes itched, the flowers were too bright, the hymns made everyone cry harder. I kept expecting paint-stained Father to walk through the church doors, smiling, to tell us it had all been a mistake.

Mary stood straight as a soldier throughout the service, her jaw set with determination that was almost frightening. She’d aged years in those few days, I could see it. Florence clung to Mother’s skirts, too young to fully grasp that the wooden box at the front of the church held all that remained of the man who’d taught her to whistle and brought her peppermints from town.

And Mother... Mother looked like she might blow away if the wind caught her wrong. The black dress hung loose on her frame—she’d barely eaten since Uncle Henry’s visit. But she held her head high during the service, accepting the condolences of neighbours and Father’s fellow workers with quiet dignity.

After the burial, people returned to the house. It’s strange how death makes people hungry—platters of food appeared, and voices gradually rose from whispers to normal conversation. I found myself watching it all as if from a great distance, memorising details I didn’t understand were important: how Uncle Henry kept checking his pocket watch, how Mother accepted sympathy with the same gracious nod she’d once used for compliments about her garden.

In the weeks that followed, our new life took shape around Father’s absence. Mother did indeed take in sewing, her nimble fingers working late into the evening by lamplight. Mary had a breakdown and was admitted to an asylum. In time, she recovered and found work again as a domestic servant. Meanwhile, I found work as a pattern girl over in Nottingham, with the Bevin family. I visited Mother whenever I could, bringing her money to help her get by. Florence stayed with Mother and became a seamstress.

We learned to live quietly, carefully. Mourning clothes were expensive, but neighbours donated black fabric. We learned to speak of Father in past tense, though it felt like swallowing broken glass each time. We learned that widows and orphans occupied a particular place in the world—deserving of sympathy but also of careful watching, as if poverty might be catching.

But we also learned that we were stronger than we’d known. Mother, for all her tears, proved to have a steel spine when it came to protecting her daughters.

The railway company, to their credit, provided a small pension—not enough to live on, but something. Uncle Henry made sure Mother wasn’t cheated of what was owed. And gradually, very gradually, we found our footing in this new world where we were the Carson women, not John Carson’s family.

I think often now of how that September morning changed everything, how quickly a life can pivot from contentment to sorrow. Our house on Green Lane had been filled with the sounds of Father’s trade—the clink of his brushes in the turpentine jar, the scraping of paint being mixed, the satisfied whistle he’d give when a job was done well. The Midland Railway’s London Extension had brought prosperity to men like Father, skilled tradesmen who could make the company’s stations and buildings as fine as any in England.

But that same railway—that symbol of progress and modern times—had also taken him from us in the most brutal way imaginable. The irony wasn’t lost on any of us that the very trains Father had spent years making beautiful were the instrument of his destruction.

Years later, when I sailed to Western Australia with my new husband and baby son, I understood that I was carrying more than just my own hopes across that vast ocean. I carried the strength Mother had shown in her darkest hour, the determination Mary had found at fifteen, the resilience we’d all discovered we possessed. I carried, too, the knowledge that progress and prosperity come with a price, and that the new world—for all its promise—held dangers our grandparents had never imagined.

Father’s death taught me that life is fragile, but it also taught me that love—even love interrupted by tragedy—creates a foundation strong enough to build a future on. That’s perhaps the most important lesson a twelve-year-old girl could learn, though I wouldn’t wish the learning of it on anyone.

In the space of one morning, my world had grown far bigger—and far sadder—than I ever imagined. But from that moment on, I carried the strength of the Carson women with me, wherever I went.

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Author’s Note

This story is a blend of family history and imagination. While it’s based on real people and true events, I’ve taken creative liberties to explore what my great-grandmother’s experience might have felt like. To help shape and refine this narrative, I’ve used AI tools—Claude.ai and ChatGPT—as collaborators in the writing process. I’m not a fiction writer by any means, but with their support, I’ve been able to bring history to life in a new and meaningful way. Thank you for sharing in this experiment with me.

If you’d like to read the factual account behind this story, I’ve written more about my great-great-grandfather in Brush Strokes and Railway Tracks: the life of John Carson over on my WeAre.xyz archive.