Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1891-07-04

the Wrltnlng victims, who shrieked and
implored in vain for help. that was will
Ing enough, but alas, far too weak to
tear aside iron and timbers before
wreck and fame had done their worst
There were very few injured who did
not die, and very few dead who we're
not bruised and broken, and blackened
and burned out of all semblance to the
form of their maker.
Thos. Coville, was taken ont OF the
wreck alive. He was terribly crushed
and burned and his sufferings were
awful to behold. In an agonizing voice
he called, BILLY, for Gods sake get an
Henry Gildea was badly injured and
died soon after being taken to the
hotel.
A SURVIVORS, STORY.
Tom Hanley, of Corning, who was in
the fatal rear car with score of bright,
lively fellow glassworkers on their way
home to Corning, after good seasons
work in Ohio, says II W asa miracle that
single occupant of the car escaped to
tell of what followed the crash. 81 was
half asleep" said he, ''listening in a
lazy way to the jokes and occas ional
cheerful growl from one of our friends
In q corner vainly attempting to get
some sleep, when I fancied heard
man cry out in alarm. Too sleepy to
fully investigate, / glanced up and
around the car and sunk back into the
seat. Opening my eyes the next mo-
ment, 1t seemed as if had fallen asleep
and awakened in another world. l
seemed to feel no shock-only a
smothered crash and dull sensa-
tion Of pain, resulting probably from
| the terrific blow l received In
the back of the head. Then a reallza-
tion of what happened came only too
soon, as the most horrible groans and
cries came from every side from the
poor fellows who an instant before had
been exchanging some merry remark.
Then came the fire, and with the first
blaze stopped my ears to the scream
| of pain and terror that arose. was
wedged in by some one, my friend prob
ably, but he was so bent, twisted and
doubled under the seat and about my
benumbed legs, that l could not tell
what it was except that it was human
and living at one time but dying now as
could catch the gasping breath ana
knew it was coming from the poor 1el'
lows throat.
It was terrible but q merciful release,
a painless death TO what some or the
others had to suffer. Many were
caught and pinioned to their seats, OF
squeezed against the walls of the car,
or against the engine that had dasheo
into and throught the cars. Wherever
they were, there they stood, or lay
pleading in vain for help, and seeing
every moment the warm flames creep
and tbne BY one their cries were stilled
as they gave up the fight for life. The
flames could not be stopped on their
terrible march of death until water had
been poured on the wreck for hours, ii
seemed to the agonized onlookers, but
in reality all that human power could
do, was done then.
A sIcKENING SIGHT.
At daylight subdued and fearful
crowd of several hundred stood at the
station gazing with fearful eyes upon a
was a smothering, awful odor of burn
ing human flesh, arising from mass of
blackened, heaped-up wreckage. Now
and then ones eyes chanced upon little
piles Of clothing or scared flesh and
bones, or little piles of what might have
been human, each and all blackened
and roasted to horrible degree. Prob
ably the most fearful sight, il any one
could be worse than the other, was the
appearance Of the front of the boiler of
the freight engine. In the first shock
the front end of the boiler was broken
in, and as the engine tore its way
through the mass Of humanity, four
poor fellows were actually scooped
up in the cauldron, wounded
and helpless, and there they
lay slowly roasting to death before the
very eyes of the spectators, who would
but could not aid them. These were
afterward fshed out piecemeal by the
firemen's hook and mercifully covered
with sheeting. Aid for the wounded
was soon on hand. The handsome Etna
building was transformed into morgue.
and as the masses Of burned flesh were
hooked out they were hastily removed
or huddled ln little heaps.
Coroner Sherman, with his assistants,
stepped from one to the other searching
for letters or some means of identifying
one mass from the other. This was
difficult. In half a dozen instances the
entire head had been burned off.
HEADLEss, sHRIvELED FORMS.
Among the entire 10 beheaded, dis
membered bodies, but two had retained
anything resembling the features of a
human. The Coroner tenderly removed
from one form the clotted sheet toNfind
beneath the unmistakable form OF
woman, and worst of all, elapsed In her
arms. as If to shield its young limbs
from the flames that evidently con-
| sumed both, was an infant child.
The coroner had been so busy all day
gathering means of Identification that
nothing could b. done toward an inquest,
but a searching examination is now be-
ing made of the survivors. One fact has
IMPRESSED all here-not one or the train
men met with injury.
w. G.. Young,of Meadvile, conductor
the freight train, In giving his version
of the affair, said: I'VE were running at
a moderate rate OF speed, but the grade
was steep, and we had a heavy train.
The flagman was not out far enough,
and we could not see him I'm time to
stop. All the trainmen got OF In time
TO escape injury"
The wreck will be an expensive one
from a financial standpoint, as the loss
will foot up in the neighborhood OF
sI00. 600. The railway officials would
give no oninion nor make any statemen: