Southern shield., 1854-11-11
Awful Railroad Accident!
FORTY.EIGHT PERSONS KILLED
 FIFTY BADLY WOUNDED.

The most destructive Railroad acci- dent that ever occurred in this country took place on the morning of the 27th ult., on the Great Western Railway in Canada West, between Detroit and Nj agara Falls, near Chatham. The full details, which we find in the Detroit Tribune, are too long for insertion, but make some extracts. The acci- dent occurred in thick fog, by pas senger train coming in collision with a gravel train. Thos. F. Meagher,
 (the well known Irish patriot, who was a passenger, gave the editor of the Tribune full details of this awful catastrophe:
 "The train left Chatham at 4 30 A. M., and reached the fatal spot at 5 10 A. M. He { (Meagher, had been asleep about twenty minutes when he was star tied by deep rumbling noise, like the sound of heavy, spent wave, as 1t
 subsidies. On coming to clearer
 consciousness, he distinctly heard the
 crashing and ripping of timbers all a.
 round him, mingled with the most fear
 ful shrieks and groans and the noise
 of escaping steam. The floor under
 him was vibrating while he was crush
 ed in his seat, the roof falling down
 immediately before him, striking him
 in the face with large, torn fragment.
 He made an instant effort to get clear
 from the ruins, but found his tight foot
 caught beneath the seat and the bro
 ken floor. Upon making a second tri-
 al he succeeded in drawing out his leg, leaving the boot in the ruins, as if in
 boot-jack. He succeeded in reach
 ing the rear door where he stumbled O.
 yer the body of John Martin, the brake
 man, at that end of the car. He had ' been evidently at the brake at the mo- |, ment of the collision, and was flung back into the doorway of the car.- On procuring a lamp, little after, he found that Martin had both thighs and
 both arms broken-the latter above
 the elbows. His head, too, appears to have been dreadfully bruised, though no wound could be perceived. This noble fellow deserves especial mention. Upon going to him, when the morning broke, and offering to remove him to a comfortable situation, he answered,
 ''Neyer mind me-help those who are living, for am done for" 7" Somewhat later, upon bringing him drink of
 water, he asked NIeagher to turn him
 on his side little more, so that he
 might die quietly.
 Fires were immediately kindled by I the passengers, which afforded light l by which at a glance the awful wreck
 and havoc which had been made could be seen.
 ! The passenger engine and tender were lying at the foot of the embark
 ment-some 20 feet high-bottom up- wards, smashed into fragments, with
 the smoke stack and iron portions en- bedded in the marsh, which at this point Baptist Creek stretches away on both sides of the road. The fire
 had been thrown completely out, and the hot cinders were smoking in the
 wet grass. The first baggage car was
 perfectly unhurt; but the second one
 was dashed into the first second class
 car, and with the latter formed an im-
 mense mass of splinters, woodwork,
 lron-Work, bones, brains, mangled flesh, |, torn clothes, broken rifles, loaves of bread and other eatables, jumbled to- gether as if a mine of gun-powder had : blown them into this enormous heap of
 rubbish. The last second class car t had been driven right upon thereof of the forward frst-class car more than : half way in length. The weight of it ? had crashed in the fore part of the car beneath it, leaving the rest of it un- injured, though considerably shattered. On both sides of the embankment, below these cars were the wounded and dying-some of them flung out violent ly from the, wreck, others having crawl
 ed down with broken legs, while yet
 others had been carried to the fires by
 the passengers. It is shocking even
 to think of the scene as it would be utterly sickening to describe the vari- ous wounds and hideous mutilations in tlcted upon the poor sufferers. Lying ! immediately under the rear platform , or the forward frst-class car, he saw } the first corpse-that of a child about r three years of age. The head was !, frlghtrully swollen and discolored. He 1 lifted it up and found that a splinter about seven inches long and shaped and sharply pointed like an arrowhead had entered behind the right ear and passed through the right cheek and come out by the side of the nose.- The child was stone dead. An old la- dy with gray hair whom he assisted to
 place on cushions at the foot of the