Jasper County Democrat, Volume 12, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 September 1909 — TRAINS CRASH; 10 DEAD IN FIRE [ARTICLE]

TRAINS CRASH; 10 DEAD IN FIRE

Pennsylvania Engine Runs Into St. Paul Road Caboose. CHICAGO’S CENTER THE SCENE Victims of the Disaster Were Cattlemen Bringing Stock Into the City. Passenger Coaches Were on Their Way to Cincinnati—Six Bodies Removed From the Wreck and Four More Were In Sight of Willing Band of Rescuers—Flames Destroy Cars That Were Carrying Steers. Chicago, Sept. 28. —Ten men were killed and mere than half a dozen injured probably fatally early today whqy t Panhandle passenger train eras 4 into the rear end of a Chicago Milt kee and St. Paul stock train at TweA th and Rockwell streets. The kills were stockmen riding in the cabfr-se. Or iof the dead is Charles Bond, Milwaukee, Wis., conductor of the stock train, killed Instantly; body mangled, and another H. H. Potter, stockman.

Six others were in the caboose, which caught fire. Those who losr their lives were burned to ceath. Six of the bodies were recovered before the flames drove the rescuers back. Two of the injured, not expected to live, are: Peter Johnson, Eggleston, Minn., sixty years old; skull fractured, internal injuries. John Wallace, engineer of passenger train, Chicago; internal injuries. Running at Good Speed. The passenger train was bound or Cincinnati. It was running at good speed when the engineer saw the red lights only a few yards in front of him. He applied the emergency brake, but it w-as too late and the massive locomotive plunged through the caboose, jamming this car through the last two of the train, which were filled with cattle. Firemen were summoned at once, engine company No. 66, Captain Murphy commanding, arriving first. In the burning wreckage of the caboose the stockmen, dead and Injured, were burned so that the firemen had to use axes to get to them. They cut away the timbers and dug out those whose cries showed they were alive and conscious, then the rescuers turned their attention to getting out the dead.

It was stated that perhaps more than ten were killed. Six bodies were recovered and four more were within sight of the rescuers. Few In Day Coach. The passenger train was made up of a baggage car, a day coach, a dining car and four sleeping cars. Only a few men were in the day coach, and none was hurt. Conductor John MeAuliff, Chicago, of the passenger train, was in this coach when the collision occurred and was thrown off his feet, falling in the aisle, but was not hurt severely. Neither the engineer nor the fireman of the telescoping train was hurt, as both jumped when they saw the collision was imminent. _ At Twelfth street, just south of which the accident occurred, the tracks make a sharp turn and the freight train, going at ten miles an hour, had passed this only a minute before the passenger train, going twenty-five miles an hour, reached the turn. Not until the engine went around the curve did the engineer see the other train’s lights. Both trains it seems were occupying the same tracks. Pennsylvania officials declare they do not know how the St. Paul train happened to be running on the Panhandle rails.