The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1901-05-27
FIVE KILLED, MANY INJURED
EE1D-ON COLLISION OF TROLLEY
C.fRS NEAR ALBANY.

Were Racing for Switch at the Rate o
Almost Through the Other-BotI
Motormen Among tho KiIled-Ovel
Forty of the Passengers Injured, 1--WE
Fatally.
Albany, N. Y. May 26.-Electric cars
racing for switch while running in op-
posite directions at the rate of forty
miles an hour, cost five lives this after
noon by terrific collision while over for
ty prominent people, some fatally and
others seriously injured, fill the accident
wards of the various hospitals with the
possibility of other deaths before morn
ing.
The killed are: Frank Smith, motor
man of car No. %; William Nichols
motorman of car No. 10; Maud Kellogg,
of Round Lake; Annie Rooney, of Stuy
vesant Falls; David Mahoney mate on
the Dean Richmond.
The fatally injured: George c. Bar
ry, Troy, hurt internally Fred j. Smith,
Albany, injured internally.
The seriously injured: William F.
Barry, Troy, cut on head Marie Bar
ry, Troy, leg broken; George P. Bittner,
Moorville, cut and bruised; Isaac Blau-
velt Albany leg broken; DeWett c.
Peltz, Albany, badly bruised; Mrs. De
Welt c. Peltz, Albany, badly bruised;
ChaIles Peltz, Albany, painfully bruis-
ed; Howard J. Rogers, Albany bruised
and cut; Mrs. HI. j. Rogers, Albany
cut and bruised; - Rogers, Albany
leg broken; A. Crotzley, Albany, hurt
internally; George Lane, Albany, badly
cut; Fred Herzog, Albany shoulder
dislocated
The lobby of the local postoffice filled
with dead and wounded, hysterical wo-
men and children looking for relatives
and friends, surgeons administering
temporary relief and ambulances rae
ing through the city taking the wound
ed to hospitals were the only intima-
tions of the most terrible electric line
The scene of the accident was a point
about two miles out of Greenbush on
the line of the Albany and Hudson
railway, just completed road. The
point where the cars met on the single
track was at a sharp curve and so fast
were both running and so sudden was
the collision that the motorman never
had time to put on the brakes before
south bound car No. 22 had gone almost
clean through north bound car No. II
with human flesh for a buffer, and
hung on the edge Of high bluff, with
it's load Of shrieking, MANNED human
ity. One motorman was pinioned up
against the smashed front of the south
bound car, with both legs severed and
killed instantly, while the other one
lived but a few miutes.
Fully 120 men, women and children
formed huge, struggling shrieking py-
ramid, mixed with blood, detached por-
tions of human bodies and the wreckage
of the cars. Some of the more slightly
injured of the men extricating them
selves from the quivering mass began
to pull people out of the rear ends of
the two cars, and almost every one eX-
tricated in this way was badly injured
The scenes were heart rending The
few women and children who had es-
capped injury and death were hysterical
and added their cries to the shrieks of
the dying and mutilated. Men with
broken arms and bones, dislocated
joints and bloody heads and faces tried
to assist others who were more helpless
and there were many cases of philo-
sophica1 bravery. Help had been sum-
moned from East Greenbush and vicin-
ity and in little time the bruised mass
of humanity, with the mutilated dead |
for gruesome and silent company were |
loaded on extra cars and taken to AL
bany There, ambulances and physi- |
clans had been summoned adm the
postoffice turned into morgue and hos
pital. AS fast as the physicians could
temporarily fix up the wounded they
were taken to their homes or to the
hospitals in either carriages or hospital
ambulances.
With both motormen killed, it was
hard TO get at the real cause of the
accident, but it is pretty we'll determin-
ed that it was caused by an attempt of
the south bound car to reach a second
switch instead of waiting for the north
bound at the first siding.
The cars weigh fifteen tons each and
are the largest electric cars built, but
SO frightful was the crash that both
cars were torn almost to splinters.
Both cars were filled with joyous Sun
day pleasure seekers returning from
the newly opened recreation grounds
that the new railway had just opened.
The southbound car left Albany at 4:30
o'clock and the accident occurred at
o'clock The cars on the line were
running at switch headway, that is as
q car reached a siding switch it was
supposed to wait until another going
in the opposite direction passed. The
of the southbound car reach
ed one of the switches. but seeing no
car decided to take chances
and go on to the next. 1t was at a
curve between that the two cars met.
Among the passengers ON the south
bound car was Deputy Superintendent
Howard j. Rogers, of the state depart
ment of public instruction, and his Z
family. He was accompanied by Mrs.
Rogers and their young son and daugh-
ter, all of whom were slightly injured, !
with the exception of the daughter. /
Another Texas OIL Gusher.