‘Four’s the nicest age to be, two and two and one and three…’

E Nesbit

If ever I had a favourite story of courage then it would be The Railway Children written by Edith Nesbit in 1906. If waving red flannel petticoats to stop a train doesn’t win you an engraved watch, then nothing should and although it was said that the story was plagiarised from the plot of The House by the Railway by Ada J Graves, it’s still one of my all-time favourites.

Nesbit was born in 1858 in Kennington Surrey, which isn’t too far from where I live. She was the daughter of a chemist who passed away before she was four and due to her sisters ill health, the family moved around quite a bit. They spent time in Europe where Edith was educated and on their return to the UK opted instead of London, for the countryside and their home in Hallstead, Kent was apparently the inspiration for The Railway Children although, there are some who believe it to have been the town of New Mills in Derbyshire.

Edith married her first husband Hubert Bland when she was seven months pregnant with his child.  It turns out though that she wasn’t the only one and her friend Alice Hoatson who lived with them was also pregnant to Hubert. Edith adopted the child as her own however Alice and Bland had another child together thirteen years later which Edith also adopted as her own. Nesbit did this to please her husband who threatened to leave her if she evicted Hoatson. When Bland passed away, Edith married Thomas Tucker and they lived out their final years in East Kent.  

The plaque in Well Hall Pleasaunce in her honour

Well Hall House in Eltham where Edith and Hubert lived for quite some time no longer stands, but the grounds, Well Hall Pleasaunce, are lovely and the old Tudor Mill there has been transformed into a restaurant.  There is a blue plaque in her honour on a house in Lewisham, but I resisted pursuing that because the gardens in Eltham are much nicer and along the side of the park, there is also a walk dedicated to her.

The walk at Eltham dedicated to Edith Nesbit

Nesbit’s work included over 50 novels including 11 novels for adults and 4 collections of horror stories. Nesbit was a pioneer of sorts and she combined the realistic with a fantasy world and paved the way for writers such as P L Travers and C S Lewis and also for me to say that Once upon a time just a short train ride away, a woman turned children to heroes to *make the story end just right – in the way it’s best for us.

*The Railway Children

 www.wellhall.org.uk