Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 31 July 1912 — Killed While Beating His Way on Freight Train. [ARTICLE]

Killed While Beating His Way on Freight Train.

Coroner W. J. Wright was called to Fair Oaks Sunday morning to hold an inquest over the remains of Edwin B. Bowser, a man of about 37 years of age, was found dead in a coal car on freight train No. 74, which was going north Sunday morning. A letter was found on. the man’s person, directed to himself, from his father and mother, who are inmates of the soldiers’ home at Lafayette. The train crew saw the man at Monon and warned him not to get on the train, but he heeded not the warning and got on again.—he no doubt having been on the train when it pulled in the yards at Monon. Apparently he had lain down in an end of a coal car loaded with iron pipe, and in a sudden stop of the train the heavy door at the end of the car had fallen over on him, crushing his head and causing almost instant death. Some pf the iron pipe had also slid over onto him, but this did not cause his death. , The body was found by a brakeman when the train was near Surrey, and when it reached Fair Oaks about 5:30 a. was removed and the coroner notified. Mr. Wright went up on the milk train and held the inquest and prepared the body for burial. An undertaker came up from Lafayette Sunday afternoon and took the body back to Lafayette on the milk train.