Thomas and the Great War

Prologue

Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian nationalist working for the Black Hand, was a major supporter for the freedom of Serbia from the German Empire. His garnered ideologies led to the violent assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife at Sarajevo on June 28, 1914. A month later, the World War followed.

In the year following the assassination, the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway scrapped the employments of their E1 tank engines. They were soon replaced by L. B. Billinton's latest model for heavier shunting duties called the E2.

The five year old son of one of these employees named Wilbert, whose father went away to fight against the Austro-Hungarian Empire, had curiously in a naïve way, befriended one of these new engines. His name was Thomas and his crew had been immediately selected for the North Western Railway run by Sir Topham Hatt on the Island of Sodor, which was located on the Walney Channel east of the Isle of Man.

In the absence of his mother, who was a stay-at-home housewife, Wilbert's curiosity had led him to the island by climbing on board Thomas' cab where he was taken care of by the engine and his driver and fireman. During his stay at the port terminal of Vicarstown, Wilbert made friends with another engine from the Furness Railway. He called himself Edward and proved to be a very kind engine who felt sorry for Wilbert when he missed his war-gone father.

"Why are you crying?" asked Edward.

"I haven't seen Father in a long time," came the reply.

Thomas and Edward thought for some time as to how to return the child back to his family before enemy forces could even think about invading the island as they were already bombing England via zeppelins. But it wasn't long before he remembered that his father was in an allied camp that was not too far from York and with the unexpected help of Sir Topham Hatt, sent word of the son's whereabouts in Morse code.

Traveling amongst the seafaring battles between the British and German navies on an unused battleship, Wilbert and his father were soon reunited. But first, he had to say goodbye to Thomas for everything that they shared together in the form of a friendship between a human and a steam locomotive that seemed impossible to match.

"Will I see you again?" asked Wilbert.

Thomas smiled and said, "If you ever wish to return to Sodor, it's only a whistle away."

But like most boys and their childhood escapades, Wilbert soon forgot everything as he grew up over the next thirty years. Everything he knew about Thomas, Sodor and their friendship had become a faded memory.

World War I ended with the Armistice at Compiègne on November 11, 1918. A victory for the Allies. Germany, ruined by defeat, consolidated in a nationalist party that compared directly to the communist rule in Moscow. In 1933, an Austrian named Adolf Hitler promised to avenge the downfall by becoming Führer of his own Germany, a country ruled by hate and National Socialism. The rest of the story, however....became a depressing one for its enemies.

By April 14, 1943, the United Kingdom was fighting another war...a Second World War.