Another story of someone who perished in the Tay Bridge Disaster has surfaced as campaigners continue their fund-raising towards a permanent memorial for the victims.
Ian Nimmo White, who is vice-chairman of the Tay Rail Bridge Disaster Memorial Trust, has been uncovering various tales of those associated with the 1879 disaster and is hoping they will prompt local people to dig deep and help the trust meet the £50,000 cost of a proper tribute at Riverside Drive, Dundee.
He has already spoken of Elizabeth Milne, born in Abernethy, and Annie Spence, born in Newburgh, whose bodies were never recovered. There is no record of them on any headstone.
Since then, Mr Nimmo White has had a letter from a lady called Christine Cheape, who lives in Perthshire.
She wrote on behalf of her aunt Mima Cheape, who is the great-granddaughter of Euphemia Cheape.
He said Euphemia Cheape was also born in Kilmany, Fife, and has never been formally named on a family headstone after losing her life on that terrible December night more than 130 years ago.
Mrs Cheape (51), who was married to a shoemaker called James Cheape, worked as a domestic servant in Lochee and, as fate would have it, ended up on the train which plunged into the Tay.
“From what I can glean she got on the train at Wormit, which was the last stop before the bridge,” Mr Nimmo White noted.
“Like a lot of people I think she’d gone off for a day out from her duties, as just after the bridge was built a lot of people enjoyed a day trip over the river and back again.
“It was a great novelty at that time. It’s unfortunate that the ones that I’ve highlighted are the ones whose bodies were never found and they’ve never had a proper headstone, because they literally seemed to drop into oblivion.
“It is a real pity.”
Donations to the campaign can be made at www.thetaymemorial.com.