Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1872-06-24

A terrible accident occurred this morning on
the Peoria aud Rock Island railroad, resulting
in'one OF the most destructive wrecks it has ever
been our fortune to contemplate, and creating
an excitement in the city which can hardly be
described. The regular freight train over the
road left the city this morning at its usual time,
running more than usually heavy, as freight
traffic over this line has been very great for some
time past. Conductor Fitch took out the train,
Frank Rankin on the engine, The grade from
the city to kears station is familiar to most of
| our readers The road climbs around the steep
| curves of the Cemetery hills, and when the top
of this long, heavy grade is reached there Isl gen
tie down grade of about half a mile, after which
another grade is climbed before the train reaches
Kellars station where there a'e side tracks and
where there is considerable switching done by
freight trains.
When the train started up the hill this morn
ing, Engineer John Davis ran the "pony," No.
6, to the rear OF the train, and pushed it up the
hill. He lett The train switching at kellers, and
started back: stopped near "Devil's Hole" and
took on some wood, and run on down 10 the
city, stopping his engine on the main line,
above Spring street, at Caroline crossing, we
believe. His engine men went to breakfast at
their boarding house near by, but Davis staid
with his engine and was buSily engaged in
packing his cylinder head when the accident
eliminated in the destruction of his engine.
Meanwhile The train which was left switching
at Keller's had backed too far, in one instance
4
the heavy, sudden jerk snapped one of the
coupling links, and eleven cars detached from
the train, started down the grade. Not brake.
man was on the detached portion of the train,
and Conductor Fitch made all possible speed to
reach the departing cars. They were going TOO
fast for man to catch, and after straining
every nerve and chasing after the runaway
train with one outstretched hand almost reach
ing the last bumper, Fitch was terrified to see
the train gathering new speed with every turn
of the wheels, glide out OF his reach and get uu-
der full Roadway for wild ride down Grown
bill, down Cemetery hill, across Birkets down
Washington street, into the side tracks crowded
with cars, switch engines, and the yardmen,
and what the end might be no man dared think.
The ride was a wild one. The heavy mass
started off with good rate of speed, and every
foot of track il passed over increased its terrible
and growing momentum. Bv the time it reach
ed the up grade, between Kelar's and the Gene
terv Hill, its speed and momentum were such
that it climbed the half mile of up grade with
no apparent or perceptOe dilnnution of speed.
After tins, the run was all down hill. From the
high bluffs beyond the cemetery 1t started with
renewed velocity. The landscape seemed flying
past, field and meadow and wooded hills melt.
ing into each other like the changing scenes of
disSolving views. The train thundered over
stretches of straight track with the flight of an
arrow and whrled around short curves with
terrible velocity. Faster and faster it dashed
down the slopes of the bluffs, laundering through
dark ravines, resonant with the roll of wheels
and clatter of the rails, gathering speed, in.
creaSing Its fearful velocity, adding to a momen-
tum that whirls the brain TO imagine till it
seemed impossible that wheels could turn faster
or speed more lightning like could be acquired
kears was far out of sight, the farms on
Pleasant Hill had swept by In quick half dazed
whirl the sonOrous echoes had died out of the
wooded hills and craggy rayines of the GENE
terry grade, the six mile run was almost ended
and just across the fats at Birket's lay the city
and the end Of this head-long Grazing dash.
All this time the solitary passenger sat in a
caboOse, placid and uneOncerncd. The section
men on the grade had one swift glimpse of
him as the tram passed them, He was sitting
in an arm chair, close to the door, and appeared
to be enjoying his ride very quietly. This was
Harry Thompson, of the Theatre Comique, of
this city, who was on his way to PrinceYille, or
rather, who had started for Prnceville, but came
back to Peoria at rate that no train ever be-
fore attained on any road running into this city.
No pony" or any engine could get out of the
way of the coming train. DAVIS sprang away
from the track, but before he got away fifteen
feet the crash came, gravel was thrown all over
him, and a car door came bounding after him.
Davis, good looking, wiry young fellow, an
indianapolis lad, quantity remarked to us that
when the door came, he knew the rest would be
along some time, so he didn't wait. When the
train struck the engine, it hurled the tender
clean from the track showed il along short
distance and then threw 1t bodily over into
great ditch some twenty feet Deep where it now
lies somewhat damaged, but comparatively in
good state Of preservation, when one looks at
the rest of the wreck. The engine was whirled
over and over for an entire square. and when it
stopped the front was stove IN by the oaken
braces and hmbers OF the box cars, the engine
whirled over on its side, and in that position it
blew up.
One White Line car is lying on top of the en-
CINE, and another heavy box car was hurled
clear over it, lying across the track, beyond
" No.6." Close by the engine six trucks were
piled up, and in The ditch alonsde the road, a
broad gully, twenty feet deep, is the most chaot
&c mass of fragmentary cars that the eye ever
rested on. Three cars are crushed and splin-
tered and piled into place which would be a
tight fit for any one OF them. Farther back a |
Baltimore and Ohio car, nearly the last car in
the train, has its forward trucks knocked~Out,
sent spinning ahead two car lengths, and the
car partially telescoped into another one
holding its position in the train and on the
track. Out of the eleven cars in the train seven
arc badly damaged and four or five are hopeless
ly wrecked. The caboose in which poor Thomp-
son was sitting is the worst wrecked car in the
train. To look at the splnters of the wreck it
is hard to believe that a rat could have got out
of that wreck alive, and the car in which Harry
was riding is hard to find in the debris. He was
hurled to the ground insensible and bleeding
butnot seriously injured