Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1893-05-04

COC.
machinist enough to give a dis
cription of the lomotive that drew
us over the road that day, but re.
collect distinctly the general make
up of the train. 1t was composed
of coach bodies, mostly from
Thorpe & Spragne's stage coaches
placed on trucks. The trucks were
coupled togather with chains OF
chain links, leaving from two tc
three feet slack and when the
locomotive started it took up the
slack by jerks, with sufficient force
10 jerk the passengers who sat on
seats on top of the coaches out
from under their hats and in stop
ping they came together with such
foce as to send them flying from
their seats.
"They used dry pitch pine for
fuel and there being no smoke or
spark catcher to the chimney or
smokestack, a volume of black
smoke strongly impregnated with
sparks, Goals, and cinders, came
pouring back the whole length of
the train. Each of the outside
passengers who had an umbrella,
raised it as protection against
the smoke. and fire. They were
found to be but a momentary
protection for I think in the first
mile the last one went overload,
all having their covers burned off
from the frames, when a general
melee took place among the deck
passengers, each whipping his
neighbor to put out the fire, They
presented very motley appearance
on arriving at the first station.
There rails were procured and
lashed between the trucks taking
the slack out of the coupling
chains, thereby affording us
more steady run to the top of the
inclined plane at Schenectady.
"The incidents off the train were
quito as striking as those on
the train. A general notice
having been given of the con-
templated trip, it excited not only
the curiosity of those living along
the line OF the road but those
living remote from it, causing
large collection of people at all
ly9esrjjp lhesr jjptssrrssctiipg roads along the
children, came a distance with all
kinds of conveyances and being as
ignorant of what was coming as
their horses drove up to the road
as near as they could get, only
to look at the train. AS it ap-
preached the horses took fright
and wheeled upsetting buggies,
carriages and wagons and leaving
for parts unknown to the pas
sengers if not ty their owners, and
it is not positively known that
some of them have yet stopped.
previous to the trial trip of
this locomotive train on the
Mohawk and Hudson Railroad,
the coaches had been drawn by
horses being first haulad up an
inclined plane out of Albany by
a stationary engine at the top of
which the horses were attached to
them. The conductor Of this
pioneer locomotive train was John
T. Clark, master of transportation
of the road. He was the first
railroad conductor in this country.
Before that the drivers of the
horses that pulled the coaches
collected the tickets. The signal
to start the train on this memora-
BILE occasion was given by Conduc-
tot Clark blowing a blast on tin
horn. His place on the train was
on the platform of the locomotive,
near the smokestack, which was in
the centre of the engine. He went
through the coaches and collected
the tickets which had been sold
at hotels and others public places,
before he gave the signal to David