The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-06-28
ONLY SEVEN MET DEATH
WABASH WRECK FATALITIES WERE
NOT so GREAT AS FEARED.
No Passengers Lost Their Lives,
Though Many Were HHxt-AIl the
Mail Probably Destroyed.

KANSAS CITY, June 27.-Seven collins
were forwarded to st. Louis to-day from
Missouri City. They contained the remains
of victims of last nights wreck on the
Wabash road. A corrected list of the dead
is as follows:
w. S. MILLS, postal clerk, st; Louis.
O. NJ SMITH, postal clerk, st. Louis.
GUSTAVE A. SMITH, postal CLERK st.
CHARLES WINTERS. postal clerk, St.
F. w. BRINK, postal clerk st. Louis.
EDWARD GR1NpROD, baggageman, st.
Louis. -
St Louis.
The conductor Of the train, G. c. Cope
land. Of st. Louis, who was reported last
night among the dead, is still alive. He
was removed this morning to the Railroad
Hospital at Moberly. With d fractured
skull and several broken ribs, he fingers
between life and DEATH but the surgeons
express a hope that he will recover. Con-
ductor Copeland was supposed to be dead
when taken from the wreck and his body,
with a handkerchief drawn over the face,
was ranged in a row with the seven
corpses. A few minutes later some one
observed a sign of life and he was quickly
transferred to a stretcher and given every
possible attention.
OF the nineteen others injured not one
is in a critical condition. Among them all
there is not one broken limb, though many
of them were thrown three-quarterS the
length of the coach in which they were
riding. Mrs. W. Fl. Wilkinson, OF Kansas
City. is the most seriously hurt. Two small
bones of her left hand are broken and she
suffered a severe laceration Of the thigh,
as well as bruises about the face and neck.
The wounds of most of the others are
trivial
All indications are that death came to at
least four of the five unfortunate mail
clerks almost instantly Their car pitched
end first through the break in the trestle
and they must have been drowned in the
raging stream while in an unconscious con-
dition The remains of the four were car
ried from the wreck and were recovered
some distance down the stream. There
were signs of life in the body of the fifth
mail clerk when rescuers dragged him from
the wreck but he died few minutes later
on the bank of the creek Last night it
was feared there were more bodies in the
stream, but careful search to-day proved
that the fatalities were limited to those
already named.
beneath the trestle where the wreck oc-
Cured. In ordinary weather it is a dry
creek bed. The storm of last night, which
was almost a coudburst, had swollen the
little stream to torrential proportions. The
flood carried away a wagon bridge short
distance above the Wabash trestle The
wreck of this bridge struck the railroad
trestle and carried away a row Of wooden
IN, Tha a
farmer noticed the perilous condition of the
trestIe and resolved to flag the passenger
train, which he knew to be about due.
For nearly an hour he stood there i'll tho
terrific downpour of rain, only to fail at
last in his good intentions. for when the
Wabash Company's New York fast mail
came laundering along the storm was al
most binding and the engineer evidently
could not see the signal which the FARMER
SO frantically waved across the track.
The locomotive struck the trestle; a mo-
ment later the disaster was presented in
all its horrors. The engine passed over,
but the tender went through with the
tu1ubnng bridge. The baggage car toppled
off on It's side, while the mail car, which
followed pitched into the stream end hrst.
Every life in this car was lost The
smoker next behind, followed. 1t was in
this car that Conductor Copeland was rid
ing. The other occupants escaped serious
injury The chair car next behind also
plunged in on the mass OF wreckage end
first and all its passengers We're thrown
to the forward end in an indescribable
heap. How they escaped with no more
serious injuries is a mystery which all the
passengers in this coach are puzzled over.
THE front end of the sleeper, next in the
rear damned into the protruding end OF
the chair car and was thus prevented from
Following the others into the chasm. The
two Excelsior Springs coaches in the rear
remained on the track.
The scene of the accident, which is but
twenty-one miles northeast of Kansas City,
near Missouri City station, was visited to-
day bv many persons. A wrecking train
worked there ali day, repairing the trestie
and raising the shattered coaches, and the
night trains are moving over the road as
usual.
The postal authorities report that proba-
bly nearly all of the mail carried on the
train was lost or destroyed. When the
wreck occurred the five postal clerks are
supposed to have had all or their pouches
orened and to have been at work distribut-
ing the mail. The car was so broken and
spIintered that most of the mail fioated off,
probably to drift into the Missouri river
and be lost The Wabash train each even
ing carries all of Kansas City afternoon
mail for. the East, and 1t is always heavy
and valuable