What had caused the accident? At first, sabotage was suspected. The coroner who presided over the inquest into the disaster received an anonymous letter, claiming that 'the catastrophe had a great deal to do with Fenianism', and that railway officials along the line to Holyhead were undercover Fenian agents. When they received intelligence that the Irish Mail on August 20 would be conveying none other than the wife and servants of the Duke of Abercorn, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, they decided that the time was ripe to strike a blow against Britain, with the intention of killing the leading government figure in Ireland.

But the letter was quickly dismissed as a hoax and the blame was placed elsewhere. Suspicion fell next on the locomotive driver. Although Arthur Thompson maintained that his train was only going at 28-30mph, other eyewitnesses claimed that it was travelling much faster. George Grundy, a seven-year-old boy, was on holiday nearby with his mother and a school friend. Later in life he became an Oxford professor and wrote 'every detail' he had witnessed in his autobiography:

"I saw what appeared to me to be a short luggage train without an engine coming down a long incline from Llanddulas on the same line as the express, and having watched trains for hours, I knew that something was wrong ... the train was going at full speed, sixty miles an hour. At the moment of impact took place the engine rose like a horse taking a fence and came down on the fourth truck..."

Despite the claims of speeding, there was much public sympathy for the engine driver who was too ill to appear at court and in October died from his injuries.

Attention then turned to the role of the brakemen. Although they swore that they were shunting safely and according to the company's regulations, the stationmaster's boy claimed that he had witnessed runaway trucks at Llanddulas several times before.

One survivor, the Marquis of Hamilton, was certain that death was instantaneous from inhaling smoke; but Catherine Dicken who lived in a cottage by the track told the inquest that she believed the victims could have been saved but were burned to death behind locked doors. She had gone to help and spoken to a lady in the train, urging her to leave. The passenger, not realising the danger she was in, told Mrs Dicken to 'Mind your own business.' A little further along, another lady with a child told her to do the same.

The London & North Western Railway was very anxious to discover the causes of the crash. There was an official inquest, a criminal trial in which the brakemen were cleared of responsibility and a report by the Board of Trade. Alongside this raged a trial by media. Correspondents to The Times put the onus for the accident squarely on the railway company for not doing enough to ensure the safety of its passengers. The Board of Trade reached a similar conclusion, recommending amongst other things that every station be connected to a telegraph system; that inflammable materials should be transported on special trains; and that only one train should be allowed on a block of line at a time. All of these recommendations were eventually implemented, but even in the 19th century cost was an important factor holding up safety measures. The human cost of the 1868 disaster cannot be calculated. The Railway Company's negligence had cut short many lives, including that of Arthur Aylmer, a lad of 18, just about to start at Trinity College, Cambridge; and that of Louisa Syme, a seven-year-old Irish girl, placed by her relatives in the care of one of the passengers at Euston.

Amongst the dead were merchants from Blackburn looking forward to a few days' recuperation by the Lakes of Killarney. They included William and Christopher Parkinson who, by rights, should never have been on the train but they had tipped the driver of the Blackburn to Liverpool train to go faster so as to make the connection at Chester and guarantee their place on the Irish Mail.

Yet, in the wake of the tragedy there also emerged some happier tales and near escapes. An American gentleman, Mr Bayard Clarke, believed to be amongst the dead, wrote to The Times stating "I am still in the land of the living and hope to continue so for some time to come." It turned out that he had not been on the train at all, but having lunch with a friend in Cheltenham.

There was also a Miss Finch returning from Switzerland who had been encouraged by her friends to spend an extra day with them in London instead of boarding the Mail on August 20.

Not least, there were those passengers joining at Chester who unknowingly made the hugely significant decision to turn right rather than left as they came from the connecting tunnel into the station. In so doing they were spared a horrible death in the first of Britain's major railway disasters.