The citizen. (Frederick City, Md.) 1895-1923, 1899-09-22
ONE CAB VANISHES
LEAVES THE MIDDLE OLA TRAIN. AND
THE CONDUCTOR is sAFFLEo.

Train Couples Again, and Completes
Its Journey Without Leaving It's
Loss Observation-Disclosures ragneu
the Conductor Tells the Story.
The most remarkable of all railroad
accidents occurred on the Chicago a
Alton railroad near Atlanta, Ill. when
a loaded car jumped out OF a freight
traln and lodged in ditch and the
traln coupled up and reached its des.
tinhtion without the crew either know
ing mat an accident had occurred or
missing the car from the train.
Charles Bragnell, of Roodhouse Ill.
the conductor the train, tells the story
He says:
When | delivered my train | was
uoiu J. was car short. | thought q
mistake must have been made in
checking me up. l was called I'D for
an explanation. The clerical records
showed plainly enough that had tax
ell out of East st. Louis a car of hard
coal that had never delivered. | had
iost 1t some place between East st.
Louis and Bloomington. couldn't ex-
plain 1t. We had made up a heavy
train, put two engines in front of it
and caboose behind II. and when I
delivered 1t would have sworn that II
stood just as we had made 1t up. and
that every car left or added along the
line was accounted for
The next morning one Of the passen-
ger crews reported coal car wrecked
In the ditch near Atlanta. When il
lnnl.n1
| had lost. The superintendent asked
me why | had not reported the wreck.
1t was news to me and it was news to
the whole crew. We knew nothing
about II. 1t seemed impossible that it
could have occurred and not have been
seen, but it did. If had read of such
a thing happened upon another road
would not have believed 1t.
The car that jumped out Of my train
was the eleventh behind the engine. 1t
was loaded with hard coal and | SUP.
pose we were running something over
twenty miles an hour when the car
Jumped out. The train WIS coupled up
with automatic couplers, and when the
car left its place the twelfth car, lust
behind 1t, came up and coupled on at
the rear of the tenth car"
The Chicago & Alton experts have
agreed that this remarkable loss of a
car out of the middle of a rapidly-run-
ming train Of twenty-one loaded cars
can he explained in but one way. The
hanSe of front truck wheel upon the
car wrecked is broken, and just below
where the car lodged the ties are
marked as though by a car off the
track The couplers catch with what
Is commonly known as the Indian
grip" catching automatically When
the fange of the coal car broke, it is
reasoned, the car left the track at that
end and uncoupled itself from the car
ahead by pulling one of the couplers,
or hands, below the plane Of the other.
AT the same time the coupler at the
other end sank below the plane of it's
mate and uncoupled the car there, and,
by some peculiar wrench, the uncou-
pied car was shot out of the train and
fell fifty feet from the track, while the
trainmen were all unconscious how
near they had been to bad wreck
and death.
1t is related among railroad men that
an occurrence very like that at Atlanta
happened years ago on the Lehigh Val
ley, where car left It's train and rolled
down long embankment and into a
thick underbrush just leafing in early
summer. The trainmen did not see the
car go and it was not known that they
had lost it until the train was checked
up and car proven missing. In lit
tie while the greening vegetation en-
tirely hid it and the disappearance Of
the car of valuable merchandise be-
came the chief mystery of the road.
When the leaves fell in the autumn the
car was found and the freight which
filled 1t was recovered with very little
loss. The lost car of the Lehigh was
not, though, as remarkably lost as the
Chicago & Alton car, for the Lehgh
ear was the last upon the train and
could easily escape. while the Chicago
& Alton car left the middle of the
train.