Heroism out from the shadows
"There was evidence they were fighting to save as many passengers as they could and they paid with their lives for it." Benedict Le Vay, British journalist
Heroism once hidden in a hard-toreach shoebox is finally being recognised.
Locomotive fireman Lance Redman ‘‘could have jumped ship’’ before the train bound for Auckland plunged into the Whangaehu River at Tangiwai on Christmas Eve in 1953, daughter Beryl Donovan said.
Instead, he and locomotive engineer Charles Parker gave their lives to save others, and Donovan lost her father at six years old.
The crash remains New Zealand’s worst ever rail disaster, killing 151 people.
A memorial service is being held at Tangiwai on May 7 to finally honour both Redman and Parker. Donovan hopes it will bring her family closure.
As children, when she and her sister were home alone, they would climb up on their mother’s wardrobe to grab a box of newspaper clippings from the Tangiwai disaster. They wanted to learn more about their father and his brave actions.
Knowing it was not an easy subject to broach with their mother, the sisters would swiftly put the box back as soon as they heard car wheels on the driveway.
Donovan said her mother never fully came to grips with the tragedy and every day she would wonder if his body would be found.
Her mother eventually remarried, but hardly ever talked about Donovan’s father. ‘‘It was too raw.’’ That Christmas Eve, as the Tangiwai railway bridge began to crumple, weakened by a lahar from Mt Ruapehu, Redman sanded the track ahead of the moving train to help it brake faster.
Parker applied the brakes about 200 metres from the bridge.
Through their bravery, Redman and Parker prevented the last three carriages, guards van and postal van, from falling into the river. This action probably saved many lives.
Redman’s body was never found – his cemetery plot remaining empty to this day.
Of the few memories Donovan had of her father – she remembered his amazing vegetable garden and his shoes, which were always ‘‘as shiny as shiny can be’’.
‘‘He was a good dad. The time we had with him was wonderful.’’
Parker’s daughter Norma Hempel said it was a very emotional time for her. ‘‘It’s a happy time, but it’s going to be a sad time too. It’s just going to be really nice for dad to be remembered as a hero.’’
Although Hempel was glad her father was finally being recognised, she wished it had been done sooner so her mother and brother could have been alive to see it.
Hempel’s sister Thelma Mcarthur, who lives in Taihape, was unable to attend the memorial service. In 2013, she told Stuff: ‘‘He was a proper dad. We played a lot of games and went swimming and had picnics.’’
A Kiwirail spokesman said the service was long overdue for the two men whose selfless actions saved so many lives.
Until now, the men have not been formally recognised.
Parker and Redman emerged as heroes when British journalist Benedict Le Vay was researching his book on the Tangiwai disaster, Weeping Waters.
Le Vay, whose curiosity about Tangiwai, while working in Wellington in the 1980s, turned into a 15-year project, found the efforts of the two men had largely gone unnoticed.
‘‘When the train was headed into the water, the usual protocol was to jump off, but they didn’t.
‘‘There was evidence they were fighting to save as many passengers as they could and they paid with their lives for it.’’
The memorial service was to this Friday to coincide with Workers’ Memorial Day, but it was moved to enable steam engines to run to and from Tangiwai.
The steam engine, from Palmerston North to Tangiwai, would be taking the same route that the illfated train took on in 1953, he said.
The day will include an unveiling of a memorial stone honouring Redman and Parker and speeches from Ruapehu District mayor Don Cameron and MP Maggie Barry. The service will run from 11.45am to 2pm at the site of the Tangiwai disaster, off State Highway 49.