Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1897-09-14
TRAINS WRECKED.
Terrible Accident on the Santa Fe
Road in Kansas
Fast Mail Collides with an Express
Near Emporia-Many Passengers
Killed and Others Are Ser1-
iously Injured.

Kansas City, Mo. Sept. "a sPec1al
to the Times from Emporia, Kan, says:
One of the worst wrecks in the history
of the Santa Fe railroad occurred three
miles east of here at about 1880 o'clock
Wednesday night. Twelve or Is per-
sons were killed and as many more were
badly hurt. The fast mail train going
cast and the Mexico and California ex-
press west bound collided head on. The
Mexico and California express was
pulled by two locomotives, and when
they struck the engine drawing the fast
mail, the boilers of oil three engines
exploded and tore hole in the ground
50 deep that the smoking cars OF the
westbound train went in on top of the
three engines and two mail cars and
balanced there, without turning over.
The passengers in the smoking car es-
capped through the windows. The front
end of this car was enveloped in vol
nme of sitting smoke and steam, belch-
ing up from the wreck below, and the
rear door was damned tight in the
wreck of the car behind. The wreck
caught fire from the engines. The cars
in the hole and the smoking car burned
to ashes in NO time. In climbing out OF
the smoking car several men fell
through the riffs into the wreck below
and it is impossible to tell whether they
escaped or were burned to death.
The Victims.
It is feared that nearly all of the
seven mail clerks persisted in the dis
aster, but so far only eight bodies have
been taken from the wreck. Those
dead are:
Jim Brennan, engineer. Topeka: Nate
Hollister. fireman, Topeka: ]. F. Sours.
Kansas City, express messenger, body al
most consumed by fire: William Frisbey.
engineer; r. A. Doran. Emporia, postal
! clerk: - Gonzalez. fireman west bound
train; unknown man. tramp; brakeman,
| name unknown. Topeka. Ben Walters, st.
! Joseph, Mo-, fireman on the west-hound
train, Is missing.
Among the seriously injured are: Claud
Holiday, Lawrence, express messenger,
both legs broken; D. c. Erter, Kansas City,
express messenger. legs broken, will die;
John Dagan. Topeka. face smashed; J. T.
Butler. county attorney Chase county, hip
| sas City, leg and arms broken; B. P.
Metik. Atchison, badly bruised; Phil
| Schier, Kansas City, hip crushed; C. A.
Van Welt, brakeman, Kansas City, badly
bruised; william Patrlck, Kansas City, leg
| and arm broken; c. D. Adams, City of
Mexico. painfully bruised; Mike Sweeney.
Gainesville. Tex. back hurt.
Mr.. Bryan Escapes.
! The west-bound train carried seven
or enght coaches, and its passengers
included many excursionists who had
been to hear Hon. w. J. Bryan speak at
the county fair at Burlington. Mr..
Bryan himself was on the train, but
was riding in the rear Pullman some
400 feet from the cars which were
wrecked. He states that nothing but
a heavy jolt was experienced by the
passengers in his coach.
! A Dozen Dead.
| Emporia, Kan, Sept. 10. - Twelve
known dead, one missing probably in
cinerated) and IA injured, two of whom
will likely die, is the record of the ter
rible head-end collision on the Santa
Fe. The first lists were mixed because
of the confusion attending the wreck,
and all day names on the list of injured
have been transferred to that of the
dead. Even now it is not positively
known that the list given is complete.