Baltimore daily commercial. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1865-1867, 1865-10-04
The Reported Attempt to Kill Gen. Grant.

The Cincinnati Commercial denies that the
railroad disaster in Indiana last week was an
attempt to kill General Grant. 1t says;
''The special train which conveyed General
Grant from the metropolis of Indiana to Gin
cinnati, consisted of locomotive, tender,
and one passenger Car only, and passed Gull
ford about one o clock on Wednesday morn
ing. No one at the station knew that the
train was coming, although there is telegraph
Office at the station, for the operator was sick,
and had not touched nor been at his instru-
ment for several days previous, and the up
freight train, from Cincinnati, passed at its
usual time, nine O'Clock, Tuesday night, and
the down train, from Indianapolis, passed at
its usual time, twelve O clock, twenty minutes,
Wednesday morning. Soon after this, the
people thereabouts who happened to be awake,
heard IAN unusual thing) train tearing along
at fifty miles an hour, some say, and as it
crossed the bridge heard it whistle down
brakes. This was General Grants special
train, which, after passing the SWITCH with
the exception of the hind wheels of the
passenger car, which there and then were
knocked off the track, dragging along over
the bridge and along the embankment of from
twenty two feet at the bridge till it merged
into the level of the road, nearly three hun
dred yards this side the bridge. Here the
mystery begins and ends.
"An examination proved that the lock was
out of the switch, and the pin thrown (the
conductor on General Grants special train,
says ten feet from the switch target.
'sThis is really all that is known of the
affair, which, owing to the fact that General
Grant was on the train, has assumed import
ance and is acquiring interest.
eff the design was to kill the Lieut. General
by throwing the train from the track, better
place could not have been selected on the
whole route, but the would-be assassin must
have known that the train was coming at the
very moment it was, and removed the lock and
pin in the very nick of time, for if he had
made his deadly preparations many minutes
scores of precious lives, would have rested
upon the danger prepared for the down special
train. A fact to favor the assassination theory
is this, that this switch is used only for trains
from Cincinnati, and to put them on the side
track in case of meeting others; hence, when
the switch is shifted for down train, like
General Grants special, the consequence
would be to throw it entirely off, and with the
impetus any train has in running, plTse 1t IN INTO
the frightful gorge of the stony-hsdded Tan
ner's creek.
''But the question is, was the switch opened
| between the passage ur and down OF the
freight and passenger trains, ana tnat OF Oeh
| Grant special? II it was, it was done so
bunglingly that the hind wheels of the hind
| truck of the csr only were displaced, for it
must still be borne in mind that the locomo-
| tive, tender and fore end of the car kept the
track throughout; whereas any one devilish
enough to perpetrate such an act would have
had sense enough left to completely displace
the switch, and thus completely accomplish
the design, the effect of which is shown above.
"a careful examination of the situation,
however, and an intelligent sitting of the cir
| cumstances and facts, as far as ordinary abili-
| ty goes, favors the conclusion that there was
| no design whatever to kill Lieutenant General
| Grant by throwing his special train off the
track at Guilford Station, but if future devel-
opments go to show or prove that there was,
they must be looked for from other sources
than Guilford, its people or surroundings"