FORGOTTEN MANCHESTER: The dark secrets buried under Victoria Station

Next time you’re stuck at Victoria Station late at night when your Northern train is inevitably delayed, again, keep an eye out for any spooky goings on.

That’s because Victoria has a dark history, one that stretches back to the time before it became a bustling transport hub.

Back in the early 1800s Manchester was hit by a cholera epidemic that killed thousands of people, and most victims were buried at Walkers Croft – a 19th century church and graveyard.

Victoria Station was built on top of this burial area in the 1840s, with most of the site submerged as ground level was raised during construction.

The underground entrance at the end of Walker’s Croft opposite Victoria Station – Credit: Christopher Elison / Flickr

Walkers Croft was situated next to a workhouse and primarily catered for pauper and public grave burials, with those who couldn’t afford a proper funeral piled on top of each other in mass graves.

The death toll from cholera was incredibly high, although thousands managed to survive by drinking beer instead of the disease-ridden water.

Like other burial sites during the 1820s, the cholera pits were pillaged by body snatchers who would steal corpses and sell them to anatomy schools for dissection, which was a very lucrative trade at the time.

The next decade saw a huge public scandal hit the burial site, after three-year-old cholera victim John Brogan was delivered to Walkers Croft without his head, which had been mysteriously replaced by a brick.

A surgeon eventually tracked down the young boy’s head to Robert Oldham’s house. Oldham was a dispenser of medicines at the hospital, and although a warrant was issued for his arrest it’s thought he fled the country before he could face justice.

David Dixon / Geograph

The cemetery lies underneath the Metrolink tram platforms, while the old workhouse was situated over on the northern side of the station, where Manchester Arena sits now.

Over the years some of the bodies were dug up due to various redevelopments and extensions, and as recently as 2010 human remains have been found – these were carefully excavated and reinterred at Southern Cemetery.

So next time you’re getting a pre-train Greggs, do a double-take to make sure that pale looking child out of the corner of your eye is real…