Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer – Wednesday 16 June 1948

Girls Tried To Stop Runaway Bus After Driver Had Fainted

A 17-year-old girl told me to-night how she and workmate tried to take control of a runaway bus, which hit an electricity pole, crashed through a wall and overturned in a field.

The girl is Ivy Barton, of Park Road, Thurnscoe. She was seated behind the driver in a bus which was taking 16 girls to Bradford, where they are employed as spinners. Beside her was Glenwin Morris (23), of Great Houghton.

As the bus was going down, a slight hill, Ivy told me, she saw the driver Miss Ivy Barton Miss Glenwin Morris fall over the wheel. It is understood that he fainted. Glenwin pushed him to one side and then we both grabbed the wheel,” she said. I was trying to get at the switch to stop the engine, but I hadn’t time. Most of the girls were dozing when the bus mounted the causeway.”

The bus is owned by E. and C. Musgrave, South Kirkby, and the driver, Bonnie Roberts (32), Exchange Street, South Elmsall, is in Wakefield Clayton Hospital.

The girls, thrown about inside the bus, escaped with superficial injuries. Five had treatment at the hospital.