South Yorkshire Times, February 19th, 1949
Coroner Though Bus Should Have Missed Swinton Child
How a two year old child walked 19 feet across a road and was knocked down and killed by a bus which left a 38 foot brake mark in the road in trying to avoid her was described in evidence at a Mexborough Montagu Hospital inquest on Monday on Susan Caistor of “Corbiere,” Racecourse Road, Swinton, who was killed near home last Thursday.
Coroner Surprised
The District Coroner (Mr W.H. Carlile) said he was surprised that the child should have been knocked down. He thought the driver of the bus, Douglas Arthur Higginbottom, Willow Bridge Road, Town End, Doncaster, should have avoided the child with ordinary care.
A passenger on the bus. Gladys Smith, of Grange View, West Melton, said she was sitting in the front of the bus, which was travelling along Racecourse Road towards Wath when she noticed a group of children standing on the pavement about 40 feet away on the other side of the road. A little girl left the other children and started walking across the road when she was near the bus. Witness lost sight of her.
Higginbottom said he first saw the children about 40 feet away. He was travelling in third gear and at the time was a giving a roadway on his left a wide berth “because of the possibility of oncoming traffic. When the child left the pavement he did not know whether or not she would, continue walking or return to the pavement as some people did. He swerved to the left side of the road to avoid her, but failed; He picked the child up behind the off-side front wheel of the bus.
The Coroner said he thought that Higginbottom, travelling in third gear as he said he was, could have easily braked and avoided the child, particularly as he first saw her 40 aet away and the child travelled 19 feet across the road.
In reply Higginbottom said that the brakes of the bus were reasonable.
Mr C.M. Pratt, representing the Yorkshire Traction Co. put forward the view that a bus could not brake in its own length or brake as well as a light car.
Mr. Carlile, summing up, said there was no suggestion of criminal negligence, and he thought that children of such a small age should not be allowed to play unattended on the pavement where traffic was passing.
The jury returned a verdict of “Accidental death.”