Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1885-12-28
A MIRACULOUS ESCAPE.
The Engine Of the Boston Express Goes
over 60 Foot Enbankment; also the
Mail Car-The Fireman Killed.

NEW YORK, Dec 27,
At clock this A. N. the Boston express
train, which started from Boston at 10. 80
Saturday night was bowling along towards
TINS city at the rate of 45 miles an hour, and
when within l6 miles of its destination a
serious accident occurred. Behind the loco
motive was the mail car of F. S. McCaus-
iand and seven assistants, baggage car,
smoker. ordinary passenger coach, Mann
boudoir car Martha" and two Boston &
Albany sleepers, Nos. l13 and ia. All we're
we'll filled with sleeping passengers. Sud
denly there was a cloud of dust which burst
before the engineers eyes, obstructinp his
vision. In another instant the locomotive
plunged head first down sixty foot embank-
ment on the right hand side of the track.
striking stone wall and falling over on its
left side mass of ruins. The engineer lay
IN ditch OF ice water, and the fireman lay
crushed under the engine. The tender fol-
lowed the engine anI landed on its bottom
some distance beyond, its track being literally
torn to pieces and scattered in fragments over
the bank. The mail car ran along the edge
OF the bank about 100 feet, and then plunged
endways down the 60 foot back, at right
angles with the track, and rolled over on the
left side where it Stopped. In this car were
the southern and western mails with Chief
Clerk McCausland and seven assistants. All
went down with the car, being forced into the
end of it together with mail bags and tables
The baggage car which was next in order
did not leave the rails. The rear trucks of
the regular coach, next to it, went of and all
the sleepers followed, turning nearly over on
their right sides and throwing the passengers
who were sleeping in berths on the left hand
side into the berths on the right hand side.
q al III, l. oc
the precipice their wheels buried in the half
frozen earth up to the axles. Instantly there
was terrible excitement. The passengers
rushed out of the sleepers in their night
clothes into the darkness to witness the terri
Bile wreck and realize their wonderful escape
from instant death Shouts of the impris-
oned postal clerks and the groans of the fire.
man and engineer told the excited passengers
that help was needed few passengers
were slightly scratched and one man, who
declined to give his name or address, was cut
on the hand with broken glass.
The passengers felt their way down the
enbankment where they found the engineer
frozen fast in the ditch and the fireman
groaning with pain alongside the Locomotive.
Both were gathered up and taken to the depot
and medical aid summoned, but before it
arrived the fireman died. Engineer Phillips,
however, soon recovered and assisted in help
ing the postal clerks out of their prison box.
All the postal clerks were released unin-
jured from their uncomfortable and danger
Gus imprisonment in the postal car and all
the mails were removed intact, The depot
platform, which had extended about 60 feet
west of the depot, was missing. 1t is appar-
ant that the gale and wind had raised it from
its foundation and flung it on the track in
front of the advancing train. This accounted
for the cloud of dust the engineer saw the
moment before the fatal plunge. The plat
form was built on posts and stood at the very
commencement of the filling which makes
the high enbankment. 1t does not appear that
any fastening was used to hold the platform to
the supporting posts and prevent it from
blowing away. The wind at that point has q
strong sweep across the valley which is funnel
shaped, and sudden gale of wind could cas-
lily raise the platform from the posts and
throw it across the track. This was what
happended and the train was wrecked because
this platform was not spiked to its foundation.
The train had ground the platform to atoms
while passing over it and had thrown it from
the track, running one of the narrowest es-
capes on record.