The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1893-10-14

OF the towns-people, and to them and
the citizens generally is due great
credit for the attention bestowed upon
the sufferers. Though thousands of
splinters were scattered about this
morning, but few remain on the
ground tonight. They have been car
ried away by the curious as memen-
toes Of the awful wreck.
The cushions, despatched with the
blood of the killed, have been torn to
shreds and carried away likewise.
The cause of the wreck is mys-
terry. Some of the railroad officials
say the only responsible agent is En-
gineer Whalen, but none of them say
he can be fairly held responsible for
it. The air brakes would not work,
and nobody feels competent to explain
why they wouldn't The two trains
were delivered to the Michigan Cen
trail at Buffalo, one from the New
York Central and the other from the
| Delaware, Lackawanna q Western.
Both were excursions, the passengers
having been picked UP at local points
in New York and Pennsylvania. Engi-
neer Whalen was able tonight TO talk
to a representative of the Associated
Press. He said the engine was new
one and in all particulars had worked
beautifully on the run from Detroit.
He stopped at two points and slowed
down at one junction and on these
three occasions the air worked per-
fectly. Just east of Jackson juno
ton, a mile east of where the disaster
occurred, he touched the air and found
it all right AS the train crossed
Elmer avenue, he began to slow down
and applied the air. He found the
brake held on the engine, but would
not on the train. He then whistled
for hand brakes and reversed his en-
CINE. The fireman jumped but Whalen
staid with the engine until within
three car lengths of the other train,
when he went out through the cab
window, as he hadn't time to reach
the gangway. The only possible ex-
PLANTATION Whalen has for the failure
for the air to work is that while lying
at Ypsilante, some miscreant may
have turned the shutoff cock between
the tender and the cars.
This wreck is the first one of conse-
ouence on the Michigan Central since
Oct. 10, 1879, when the west bound Pa
|cific express crashed into the switch
engine and several freight cars about
a mile east of today's happening,
killing eighteen people and injuring
thirty-ive
James A. Hyde, of New York city,
who was standing near the wrecked
train on the platform as the other train
crashed into it, says the sight was
the most awful he ever witnessed.
he jumped, and adds that he never
saw such an expression Of agony on
ia mans face.
All the passengers, both those who
ESCAPED and those who were in the eat
ing room of the station at the time had
interesting stories to tell of their ex-
|perienceS.
The tale of 7. N. Beardslee, of East
on Canton, Va, was a particularly sad
one. He escaped injury himself, but
his wife was killed and his daughter
$50 severely hurt she cannot recover.
81 had brought some coffee to my
wife and daughter a few moments be-
fore" said he, land gone to the smok-
Ter near the head of the train to have
IA cigar. l had scarcely got seated when
the awful crash came. When l rushed
back, [ found the car in which my
folks had been seated in the midst of
the wreck. The first of the injured I
discovered was my daughter. A few
feet from ner [ found my wife dead
she had been struck in the head and
forced through the front of the carr
one of the chastity phases of the ac-
cident was the decapitation of Mrs.
ID. u. Gibbs. She was accompanied
by her husband, who was out on the
platform at the time of the collision.
She was not identified until tonight
Her husband was one of the active
searchers in the wreck, but did not
recognize her remains when taken out.
He made trip through the different
undertaking establishments tonight
and was Mortified to find his wife's
body headless. There is an ordinance
in Jackson prohibiting the running of
trains faster than six miles an hour
inside of the city limits, and it is
stated tonight that had this been OBJ
served the wreck could not have oc-
Cured, but the train, according to
competent witnesses, was running at
least twenty and possibly thirty miles
an hour just before it reached the sta
ton.