Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1878-01-25

stations between this city and thatplace
who came to attend the Moody and
Sankey meeting. Two engines, q bag
gage and three passenger coaches went
down on the western END of the bridge.
the engines touching the shore, three
cars breaking through the ice in three
feet of water and one car resting on
end ON the pier. ,
The bridge was completed in Decem-
ber, 1875. 1t is Howe truss with two
spans, each span being 1853 feet long.
There seems to have been nothing
wrong with the structure. The timbers
where they were broken off and splin-
tered are sound The spans were long,
but some of the most experienced rail-
road men agree that the accident was
wholly caused by the tremendous weight
of two locomotives passing over at the
same time. Both certainly weighed
sixty tons and possibly more. The sup
position is that the supporting iron rods
broke, causing the timbers to snap.
The bridge is elevated about ten feet
above the river at the present stage Of
the water, and is approached from the
east by an embankment, and from the
west by long trestle-work across the
meadow.
The first locomotive had cleared the
west span, and entered upon the tres
tle-wOrk, when the entire span gave
way, breaking off Immediately east of
the heavy stone pier in the center of the
river. As the structure gave way the
first locomotive was hurled violently
over and imbedded in the ground, and
completely wrecked. The other engine
and baggage-car went down with the
wreck in an upright position, and the
side of the heavy truss fell over upon
them. The first passenger car was
whirled around and sank to the bottom
of the river, lying nearly parallel with
the stream. The second passenger car
went down end foremost upon the first
car, smashing the largest portion into
| kindling wood; the rear end resting
upon the bridge. The next car occu-
pied similar position, but swerved to
the left and did not rest upon the car in
front. None of the remaining coaches
left the track.
The crash and cries of the wounded
and dying speedily brought assistance,
but the first comers worked at great
| disadvantage. The cars had broken
through the ice, which made it difficult
to approach near enough to reach the
| passengers.
The scenes in the relief train were
heartrending. In every car were men
| and women with hands bandaged or
arms in slings. Some had been terri
bly, scalded. In one passenger-car were
the bodies of three women, and in the
| baggage-car two more, just as they had
been taken from the wreck. Rev. Mr..
| Thomas. of Winsted, with both legs
fractured and severely injured internal
ly, crawled out of the wreck through
the roof of the car to the ice and then
to the shore.
The followingis list of the killed and
badly wounded as far as reported to-
night: Killed-Miss Minnie Allen, the
two Misses McCarger, of Winstead;
George Pinney, William Gilman, Elias
E. Gilman, Henry Murray, and Ben
iamin Gilks, of New Hartford; Engineer
George Hatch, of Hartford; Mrs. Will
lam Jones, of Lakeville; Janet Warner,
of East Canaan; Howard E. Warner, OF
Canton. Badly wounded-Fred Hotch-
kiss, of Canton; Frank Pinney, of West
Winsted; Rev. William H. Thomas, OF
Winsted; Austin Adams and Mrs. Hum
phrey, of Canada.
Nearly all the dead were in the first
passenger car, which is almost com.
plete wreck, although one body was
taken from the second car this evening,
where it was found caught under a
broken seat Five young men from
New Hartford, among the killed, were
of a party of six, who were on the plat
form of the car enjoying the moonlight
ride and whistling in chorus. The only
survivor of these six was inside at the
time of the accident.