Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 June 1884 — WRECKED ON THE SAIL. [ARTICLE]

WRECKED ON THE SAIL.

An Excursion Train Filled with Children Collides with an Ao* commodation. Eight Railroad Men Killed—Nearly a Score of the Passengers Injured. [Philadelphia telegram.] There was a crash on the Cam den and Atlantic Railroad this morning. Two trains came together with terrible force. Eight people were killed, and of the dozen or more wounded several will probably die. At 8:30 a train of three cars left Camden, N. J., for Lakeside with children from the Second Presbyterian Church on an excursion. At 7 o’clock an accommodation, train of seven cars left Atlantic City for Camden and Philadelphia. The trains should have passed at Ashland Station. Superintendent Bannard sent a telegram to the operator at Ashland to hold the accommodation on a side track there until the excursion had passed. Somehow the accommodation got by Ashland, and about a mile this side rushed headlong into the excursion train. r “I was sitting in the smoker of the accommodation, ” said James Anderson, of Atco, N. J., “when I heard the shrill whistle of a locomotive, which was followed by similar signals from another locomotive (close by. I thought that something was wrong, and I immediately jumped to my feet. At that instant the air-brake was applied. and the movement of the train was brought to a stop so suddenly and with such force as to -throw me down-on the the ear. I quickly regained my feet, and on glancing around I found that all the other passengers, of whom there were about twenty in the car, had also been thrown out of their seats. This was all tiie work of a few seconds, and was followed by a terrible. crash as the two trains came together. The smoking-car was the third from the locomotive, and was pretty well used up. After the collision occurred we all scrambled out of the car, some escaping by the windows. Both locomotives were completely demolished by the collision, and the escaping steam made it impossible for some time for any one to approach within fifty feet of the wreck. , “ Great excitement existed among the people in the two trains, especially among the women and children composing the excursion train. The sight presented after (he accident occurred was a terrible The train-hands and the male passengers were running to and fro, so much excited that they were unable to render any assistaance to the injured and dying.” As soon as partial quiet had been restored the uninjured went to the assistance of the wounded. Fireman Nicholas Barber was taken out dead, with his entrails protruding. , Mail Agent Winfield Hiles was, with great difficulty, gotten out. He was lying deep under the debris, and it was some time before he was discovered. He was heard to call “Here I am,” and was thus found. .When gotten out he could not give much (account of himself, as he was terribly injured internally, and died in a short time. Frank Fenton, the surveyor of the road, who was on the train, was taken out after about two hours’ work, mangled in a terrible manner. Both engineers were killed. Conductor Albert Smith and the brakepaan, Gustavus Edwards, of the Lakeside train, were taken out dead. Smith was (counting his tickets in the front car. It was nearly an hour and a half after the accident before medical attendance was gotten bn the groundr The most affecting thing of the affair was the fact that the daughter of fcivil Engineer Fenton was on the excursion train. She looked for her father and was told that he was safe and had gone ahead to flag the trains. She then waited and walked to Haddonfield. In. a few minutes after she had gone her father was taken out of the ruins, his head almost flattened where it had been crushed. The point where the collision occurred is considered the worst on the line. It is about two miles from Haddonfield, and one mile from Ashland, with a heavy down grade and curve in both directions. In the middle of the curve is a wooden bridge over Cooper’s Creek. There is only a single track on the curve, with a light embankment on either side: The accommodation wag running at the rate of twenty-two miles an hour when it entered the curve.