The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1893-09-04

clSc1SSAT1, oH1o, Sept s.-To.night
ut 8 o'clock, on the electric railway
from Avoudale to Cincinnati, all the
brakes OF an incoming train of two
cars gave way simultaneously. This
was at McGregor avenue on Hunt
street, which was formerly called the
Reading, or Avondale, road. For mile
and quarter from this point the road
is down grade. It makes a long curve
before intersecting with Broadway,
which street it enters at right angles.
Tho grade for four hundred yards be.
fore entering Broadway is five or ak
feet to the hundred. The motorman,
when the brakes failed, tried to reverse
the wheels, but the wires OF the con-
troller burnt of, and motorman, con-
ductor and forty-fye passengers were
at the mercy of that wild train.
Faster and faster it sped. A chorus
Of shrieks made the air dismal. Now
and then passenger dropped out on
the stony street. At the half mile from
the starting point the speed was thirty
miles an hour. Swifter and switter
sped the two fated cars; louder and
more despairing grew the screams.
Around the great bend the train shot
at fifty miles an hour with speed ac-
celebrating every second. Into Broad
way it dashed at seventy-fve miles an
hour. Tearing across the street 1t
struck a big cedar telegraph pole out of
the lower part of which it cut log
where the platform and the top Of the
car struck the pole. This piece OF pole
was dropped onto the ground while the
upper part Of the pole was suspended
by the wires in the air.
After cutting through the pole the
great iron frame OF the car went on and
struck huge iron door-post in the
building at the corner, split upon Il,
and thrust half the length of the car
into the building. Oyer this mass of
puiyerized ruin the rear car leaped to
destruction.
All around in this heap of confusion
were scattered the dead and dying hu-
man freight. So far as can be learned
not soul escaped. One is already
known to be dead; eighteen are in the
hospital, and searchers are out all along
that fatal mile and a quarter trying to
learn the fate of those strewn along the
road.
The cars used were open summer
cars. Conductor Charles Smith was
collecting fares when Motorman George
w. Davine informed him at McGregor
avenue that the brakes were all dis
abled. ImmediatelYwhen the motormau
reversed his wheels. or tried to reverse
them, and found that the controlling
apparatus had burned out, he informed
the conductor OF 1.-THE fact Both Smith
and Devine then became panic stricken
and Jumped for their lives. Both sui.
fered sprained wrists and slight
bruises.
The following Is classified list OF
fatalities as fur as obtained at this hour.
They are all Of Cincinnati:
Mamie Nairen, aged IS, lower river
road.
Issf.s 1ssaiy EsSafG 1554asGi aged es leg and arm
Louisa Berkeley. skull fractured, spine
injured.
mary MaaoneyJ ageo ~, skah tEae-
Sarah Dublin, skull fractured.
Mrs. Walter Richards, Fairmont, in.
ternally.
Miss Lulu Bast, skull fractured.
Twenty others were more or less ser.
iously injured.
Summary: Killed l. Fatally injured
s. Dangerously injured II. Slightly
injured IL Not heard from 16.
OF the sixteen not heard from It is
supposed the injuries are slight from
jumping of.
Miss Clara Paul with five children
stuck ON to the last and for wonder
got out of the wreck with small injury.
The car with its great iron frame and
its load weighed several tons.