Returning from a Rickmansworth cinema with her brother David, aged eight, and a young friend, Susan Mary Warren, six-year-old daughter of Mr and Mrs G.D. Warren of Main Avenue, Moor Park, fell from a moving train on Saturday afternoon and was next seen walking home alongside the track.

Except for abrasions and cuts, for which she was treated at the Peace Memorial Hospital, Watford, Susan was uninjured.

She was also given injections for shock at the hospital, where nurses said she was the pluckiest little girl they had ever met. She refused to cry even when stitches were inserted in her head.

Her parents learned that Susan attempted to close the carriage window and fell out when the door suddenly flew open.

The three children were alone in the carriage and the first the little boys, who were sitting at the other end of the compartment, knew was that the door was wide open and Susan had disappeared.

Station officials at Moor Park found it difficult to understand the frightened, excited boys’ story, but communicated with Rickmansworth station and the signal box at the junction for Croxley, and trains were held up while a search was made.

The signalman was the first to find the little girl, who had been crossing and recrossing the track to avoid passing trains.

 An amazing feature of Susan’s adventure is the fact that her coat, which was torn, appears to be singed, as if from contact with the live rail.

Mrs Warren said Susan told her she was lying across the track when she fell and as the train had disappeared when she got up it is believed to have been travelling at speed.

Mrs Warren added that she had often warned David not to tamper with the communication cord in trains and thinks that is why the little boys did nothing until the train reached Moor Park.

Mr Warren is well-known locally as manager of Warwick’s, the butchers of Main Avenue, Moor Park. Both parents describe their daughter’s escape as a miracle.

[From the Watford Observer of February 3, 1950]