In 1934 Agatha Christie wrote her famous mystery novel ‘Murder on the Orient Express.’ It is considered the most widely read mystery novel of all time.
The story took place on the Orient Express train which stopped because of heavy snowfall. But ‘Orient Express’ was not a fictional name that the writer used in her story. There was a real-life Orient Express at that time.
The Orient Express began its journey half a century before Agatha Christie’s novel. The history of the Orient Express goes back to 1867 when a Belgian Engineer, Georges Nagelmackers went to the United States and saw the world’s first trains with sleeping cars. He dreamed of introducing luxurious trains in Europe for long-distance travel.
In 1874 he founded ‘Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits’ which translates to ‘International Sleeping Car company’ in English. On October 4, 1883, the first Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits train ‘Express d’Orient’ left Paris for Istanbul with forty passengers on board. The round trip took thirteen days.
In 1891 ‘Express d’Orient’ was officially renamed ‘Orient Express’. The orient express was famous for its luxury, comfort, and service in those days. The coaches were made of wood. Their internal decoration, furniture, sleeping berth, tableware, etc. were all stylish and sophisticated. There was a well-equipped restaurant car for serving freshly prepared food. The wooden coaches were eventually replaced by metal ones during the late nineteen twenties.
When Agatha Christie’s novel ‘Murder on the Orient Express’ came out, the Orient Express was having its heyday. However, with the advancement of technology, the leisure and comfort of Orient Express gradually lost its appeal. The greatest blow came from the burgeoning air travel market. Finally, in 1977 the Orient Express stopped its journey between Paris and Istanbul.
According to an article by Ed Cunningham published on TimeOut on July 5, 2022, seventeen carriages of the original Orient Express have been found in Poland and purchased by the French hospitality company Accor.
Accor is a world-leading hospitality group operating in 110 countries. It consists of 5,300 properties and 10,000 food and beverage venues.
As detailed in Accor’s press release on June 28, 2022, the discovery of the original Orient Express carriages is miraculous. According to the account provided by Accor’s said press release and by CNN Travel, a Ph.D. scholar, Arthur Mettetal, working on the history of the Orient Express came across an anonymous YouTube video in 2015 in which some parked train carriages caught his eye. They looked like the distinctive night-blue carriages of the Orient Express. After a lot of examination and search, he could locate the carriages. Thirteen cars were lying in the open air on the border between Belarus and Poland. They were there for about ten years. Four more carriages were also found in other countries including Germany and Switzerland.
Accor’s Orient Express team tracked their owners and bought all those 17 carriages – 12 sleeping cars, 1 restaurant, 3 lounges, and 1 van. A convoy of trucks escorted by police vehicles brought them to France in 2018.
The carriages are now being restored in France. Accor announced that the new Orient Express will welcome its first passengers on board in early 2024.
So, the legacy of the Orient Express that started in 1883 is going to resume after a break of 47 years.