IT was, said the Glasgow Herald on a Monday morning exactly 135 years ago, a catastrophe of the most appalling description.

The night before - Sunday, December 28, 1879 - the central span of the Tay Bridge, at that time the longest bridge in the world, had collapsed during a violent gale estimated at Beaufort force 10/11.

A northbound ferry train from Burntisland had the misfortune to be on the bridge when the collapse happened. The six-carriage train plunged 130ft into the freezing waters of the Tay.

"Hope for the occupants of the carriages there was none," the Herald reported that Monday morning. "Even the strongest swimmer, if freed from what was literally a prison house, could have made no way in such a sea. Instant death was the most merciful fate that could have befallen those placed in such a dreadful position."

Some initial reports said that upwards of 200 people had been on board the train, but in later months the toll was revised downwards to 72 passengers and three crew.

Later still, the total was further revised to 59. Death certificates were produced for all 59; 46 bodies were recovered but the other 13 were never found. Some had drifted out into the North Sea.

Items of clothing and belongings from some of the casualties are today on show at Dundee's McManus Galleries.

The disaster inspired poems and songs, including local poet William McGonagall's work, The Tay Bridge Disaster, which was written in 1880. A few weeks ago, a local singer-songwriter, Ed Muirhead, commemorated the tragedy in a new song.

Last December, granite cairns with the names of all the victims were finally erected on both sides of the river, in Dundee and Fife.

An official inquiry chiefly blamed the bridge's designer, Sir Thomas Bouch. News reports in 2006, however, revealed four newly-discovered witness statements which spoke of concerns about the state of the bridge months before the accident happened. The evidence was never put before the inquiry.

"The Tay rail bridge is iconic," said Iain Flett, Dundee's city archivist. "As you pass over the present bridge you are reminded of the pillars of the first bridge.

"A lot of people think that the bridge totally collapsed; in fact, its brick pillars were so substantial that they had to be dynamited down to sea-level for the safety of traffic."

He added: "Although Dundonians have a love-hate relationship with McGonagall, his wonderful poem about the disaster is one of the most widely-read by primary schoolchildren anywhere in the world.

"There have been many worse train crashes and plane crashes, but just the thought of an engine flying through the air has a certain awful majesty to it that still sticks in the popular imagination.

"The bridge was very much seen as the cutting-edge of Victorian engineering. The Victorians were so confident of their engineering that there was total disbelief that something as substantial as the bridge could just collapse.

"Hogmanay in Scotland tends to be a memory of times past and I think that one of the reasons why the disaster continues to resound today is that it happened so close to Hogmanay."

As the Glasgow Herald reported on that Monday, 135 years ago: "The great bridge which Monarchs and Princes travelled from all parts to gaze at and admire, has been shattered by a force greater than that of man's, and in its ruin has unhappily caused the destruction of so many valuable lives."