Eccles, Greater Manchester along the route of the track linking those two cities. Eccles cakes, first produced and sold in the town in 1796, are now exported across the world. The derivation of the name is uncertain, but several ideas have been proposed. One is that the "Eccles" place-name is derived from the Romano-British "Ecles" or "Eglys", itself derived from the Ancient Greek "Ecclesia". Following the arrival in AD 613 of the invading Anglo-Saxons at Lancashire, many existing British place-names, especially rivers and hills (the River Irwell for example), survived intact. The root "Ecles", found in several village names, is an exception to
Eccles rail crash (1941) Eccles rail crash (1941) The 1941 Eccles rail crash occurred on 30 December 1941 at the east end of Eccles railway station in Lancashire, England. A westbound train passed danger signals in fog in the wartime blackout and collided at about 30 mph with an eastbound train traversing a crossover. A major contributory cause was that the signalman had erroneously suspended "fog working", which would give greater distances between trains, due to a misunderstanding about whether fogmen were on duty. The fog was worsened by the nearby Manchester Ship Canal and visibility was as low as 10 yards. Twenty-three people