DURING lockdown many people including myself took to researching our family histories.

Of recent years the discovery of DNA has greatly helped in locating long lost or missing family members.

During that time my mind wandered to the fatal rail accident of 1928 at Charfield where two young children perished and have never been identified.

I wonder if it is possible to extract their DNA and have it checked against the worldwide DNA database to try and identify distant relatives of the two mites and thereafter identify them.

The 92 years since the fatal crash, where 15 people died, means that any adult connected with the care of the children will have long been deceased and would not be embarrassed by a new investigation.

I do accept that probably it is too late for such an undertaking.

The only positive DNA would be from the children’s bodies and decay may well have taken place making it impossible.

And of course exhumations are rightly frowned upon.

I suspect that the two children’s names will remain unknown for the rest of eternity. Very sad.

Tom Newman

Stroud