Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1873-11-20
THE RAILROAD ACCIDENT.
FAN PartIcuIars-The Causes, as they
were Seen BY an Eyewitness.
From an Occasional Correspondent

!, From an Occasional Correspondent.
: JACKSON, Tenn, November Is, 1873. -
I sent you. yesterday, dispatch from
Columbus, Kentucky, in orming you of ,
railroad accident which had Just occur.
, red to the southern-bound train on tht
Mobile and Ohio railroad, two mlles
from Columbus. The accident was on,
of the class we seldom hear anything
about through the papers. The railway
companies and their employees satisfy
general inquiry by answering that the
cause is broken rail- ol
otherwise providential, or purely
accidental. Fortunately, there was nc
| personal damage TO any Of the forty
passengers on the train, consequently
there was q general thankfulness on the
part of each that they have escaped 90
safely, and no public Investigation OF
the causes which led to the
accident. I wish to call attention to
some of the circumstances attending
| this accident The immediate cause
was the breaking Of q rail. Why did ii
| break? Only because there was a
/ Glow joint-is. the crosstie had no foun-
dation, and gave down nearly an inch
az every truck Of the cars passed
over it, virtually leaving the
end Of the rail unsupported.
Each train, and, indeed, each truck of a
car, as 1t passes, springs down upon the
end of the rail, exerting a constant ten
| dency 70 break 1t OF. 1t Is quite well
known to all who know anything Of the
facts, that the iron on that part of the
road-some twenty miles-was, when
new, Of very inferior quality, and has,
| by long use, become cTystalized, so that,
in frosty weather, it Is exceedingly LA
BILE to break. In this case, the end of
the rail, length of less than three feet,
was broken into three distinct pieces,
and one was broken as squaTely of as
though it wers east-iron. One
truck of the expresa-car was thrown
of, and the engine and tender pass
ing over safely. Whether any
more of the train was thrown off by the
break I did not notice, but there prob
40 was. Before the train waz stopped,
however, the baggage-car was rolled
over into the ditch, and the smOkin.-
car was turned over upon its side across
the ditch. In 1t were some twenty pas
sengers, who were, of course, severely
shaken and thrown about. The first
elass-car, well filled with passengers,
was entireIy of, and also the forward
truck of one or the sleeping-coaches.
The track for four osT-lengths was COM
pIeteIy torn up, the ties and rails
being scattered in every direction.
Had we been moving faster than
fifteen miles per hour, or had the
turning over occurred two car-lengths
further on, the ears would have rolled
down an embankment. Walking back
to town, was surprised to note the con-
dition of the track. First, the road-bed
is, in many places, so narrow that the
ends of the ties outside of the rail have
no sufficient support, and this where it
is com posed only Of clay loan. There
are very mary ''town jOintsn of similar
character to the one causing the acci-
dent. In several places the ends of the
rail were between three and four inches
open, and had remained so until the
ends were badly battered and worn
away. In other places the ends of the
rails were Withdrawn from the chairs,
and were spiked on only one, or on
neither side. Many of the rails are so
badly laminated that they are, in some
parts, not more than two fingers
breadth on top. Chairs of thresOr feur
patterns are in use, some Of them nOta-
bly, worthless in character, and one of
these was at the point of the accident
At points where the fsh-bar rail has
been supplied, we noticed that scarcely
any of the joints had more than three,
and some of them but two bolts,
instead of four, in the fish-bars-
and this has been the case ever
since the war. Inquiry at Colum-
bus developed the general opinion that
the track-man in charge of the section
was VIGOROUSLY inefficient, as, indeed,
the condition of the track itself would
prove. l have been thus
particular in stating the condition of the
road, that the people who ride may
know what regard for their personal
safety is shown by this company. Re-
lying upon the ignorance of the true con-
dition, on the part of those who pass
safely over, as well as Of those who may
be detained by such an accident as they
and we are willing to ascribe to special
they allure the travel
ing public with their handsomely
printed shOw-cards and carefully
worded advertisements to their death
traps. Is there no law to compel some
regard, on the part of railway officials,
for the safety of those whom they trans
port? Certainly here is a case where
some sort of inspection-system is i'm
peratively demanded for the protection
Of life and property. have in no man
ner overstated the case as regards the
of about one mile of the road
over which l walked. l have walked
over many miles Of track, and have
had some experience in railway super
but never saw a road-bed
before in such an unsafe con-
difiop n