The Union times. [volume] (Union, S.C.) 1894-1918, 1899-01-13
THIRTEEN PASSENGERS DEAD
HEAD.ON COLLISION
ON LEMIGH VALLEY ROAD.
TRAIN ORDERS WERE MISSREAD.
Two Engines Crash Into Each Other and
Telescope Tenders and Passenger
Cnrs-w-sck Was Complete.

BY head-on collision between two
passenger trains on the Lehigh Valley
railway at West Dunellen, N. j., at
12:47 p. m, Monday, thirteen persons
were killed and over twenty-five in
jured.
The dead are: Martin keenan,, w.
Fl. Hinkel, Jacob Hesler, H. Z. Wei
kell, Frank Ficher, William H. Lead
er, Frank Markell, Theodore Koehn,
Abner s. Keifer, William H. Markell,
James Jarvis and two women who are
still to be identified.
West Dunellen is three miles from
Boundbrook, and about thirty miles
from New York city. At the spot
where the disaster occurred there is a
sharp curve in the Lehigh Valley
tracks, and steep cutting, but the
accident was due, in the first place, to
and in the second place to another ac-
cident that occurred ut Boundbrook
earlier in the day.
The scenes which accompanied the
collision, sufferings Of the injured and
the panic that reigned among the 400
passengers were well nigh indescrib-
able. The blood stained wreck of
tangled and twisted iron and wood
bore witness to the truth Of the gem
cral verdict of railroad men-that it
was one Of the worst collisions in re-
cent years.
Train No. 20, which left Shamokin,
Pa, at a. M, was so heavy with
human freight that it had to be broken
into three sections. The first two
sections arrived at Boundbrook and
switched over to the other track,
switched back Mt New Market and
reached New York in safety. The
third section of this train was almost
an hour late. Its seven cars, crowded
with 400 eXcursionists, most of them
from Mount Carmel and Shamokin,
Mahoney City, Hazelton, Ashland and
Pottsville, Pa.
The party was travelling under the
auspices Of the business mems excur-
sion. an annual event which many pat
ronize for three DAYS visit to New
| York. Their train switched over at
Boundbrook and proceeded, like the
preceding sections, on the west bound
| track.
Meanwhile there had been waiting
at New Market local train that plies
| regularly between New York and
Boundbrook. Owing to the traffic all
| going on one track, it was almost an
hour late. At last the train dispatcher
Mt South Plninticld gave it permission
to go. Just before reaching West
Dunellen Engineer Rick slowed his
train down, because he stops for pas
sengers if there are any. Martin
Brennan, the signal man. threw up
his arms and waved them, as if to say
| there were no passengers, so the local
put on steam and headed round the
curve, going Mt about twenty-five miles
an hour. There were only four pas
sengers on the local.
| In the cab of the excursion train
was James Pendergrast, the engineer,
with his fireman, George Cheshire.
| They saw the local as it started on the
curve. With shrieking whistle and
brakes grinding sparks from the
wheels, the excursion train bore down
to what seemed certain destruction.
The two engines, from which both
crews had jumped, came together with
an awful crash The local engine
turned n complete somersanlt and
came crashing down beside its now
demolished obstruction. But its career
was not ended before it had iammed
the tender Of the excursion train al
most entirely through the first car
from Shamokin. The car, or what
was left of it, rolled over, carrying
with il the imbeddcd tender, the frag.
ments of dozen bodies and the i'm
prisoned wounded.
1t was in the first car of the excnr
sion train that all the deaths and mos'
of the casualties occurred. The Other
cars, though their occupants were
badly shaken, staid on the track anC
were in condition to be hauled of.