The Sun.
London, England, 1842-12-10 00:00:00

ACCIDENT ON THE BIRMINGHAM
RAIL WAY.'
(AN OT OEN ACCOUNT.)
As the train was proceeding down a slight inclina-
tion at twenty-five minutes before twelve o'clock, noar
Northchurch, a village about a mile on the other side
of Berkhampstead, and between the latter place and
Tring, some of the passengers became aware that
all was not right, by hearing the stoker raking
out the fire from under the engine. The axle-
tree had in fact broken, and the stoker with
great presence of mind, took this precautionary
step to prevent the boiler from bursting ; the next
minute the fore wheel flew off, and the engine and
tender were thrown off the line and smashed to pieces.
The first carriage was hurled from the road, and rolled
down the embankment, and the two first-class car-
riages forced right athwart the rails. The last car-
riage received but a comparatively slight shock, the
two fore wheels only being thrown off the line and no
person within receiving any injury.
As soon as the passengers who had providentially
escaped without injury could recover from the mo-
mentary consternation into which they had been
thrown by the terrific occurrence, they ran down the
bank to assist those who had been in the first carriage.
Among those more fortunate persons luckily happened
to be Mr. T. H. Hill, a medical gentleman, who was re-
turning to London from Oxford, and who promptly
rendered all the assistance in his power to his maimed
fellow-passengers, who were found in a state of insensi-
bility, and were at first supposed to be dead. One of the
Company's overlookers, who had been in the first car-
riage, was, in its descent, thrown out at the window, and
left upon the embankment. The stoker was found to
have received a severe concussion of the brain ; and an
old man and women were found lying with their bodies
literally doubled together inside the ill-fated carriage,
They were got out with considerable difficulty,
and examined by Mr. Hill; the heads of both were
covered with blood, and on a closer examination he
found that they had both received severe lacerations
of the scalp. The,woman was also much cut about
the eyes, and the small branches of the temporal
arteries had been divided, causing profuse hemorr-
hage. By this time the sufferers had been removed—
the old man and woman to Northchurch, and the
overlooker and stoker to Berkhampstead.
An engine and some carriages were sent from Berk-
hampstead to convey the other passengers to town,
but a considerable time elapsed before the obstruction
caused by the broken engine and tender could be
removed from the line, and when that was done a new
rail had to be laid down in place of one which had
been cut asunder by the shock. The only injury
which the first-class carriages received was the de •
struction of the plate-glass in the windows.
The cause of the accident, which it is only surpris-
ing was not attended by still more lamentable results
than those which are above detailed, was unquestion-
ably a defect in the iron of which the axle was made ;
for, on examination, it was at once manifest that, not-
withstanding its appearance of strength, it possessed
very little, not more than one-fourth of the apparent
substance being real. A large hollow, like an air
bubble, appeared to have formed from the centre
nearly to the edges of the metal.
The loss which will accrue to the Company from
the damage done is estimated at 2,0001.
The train, which should have arrived shortly after
one, did not reach town until near four o'clock.

LATER PARTICULARS.
Intelligence was yesterday afternoon received at the
Euston-station of the railway, that Mrs. Bye, the
elderly woman above alluded to, had breathed
her last. She was between 60 and 70 years of age,
and her constitution received a shock which was too
much for her advanced period of life, although it had
at first been hoped she would recover.

The other sufferers are all doing well. The unfortu-
nate woman is the first passenger ever killed upon this
line of railway, the results of the former accidents
having been confined to the Company's servants.