Willmar tribune., 1902-12-31
A FRICHTFUL | |..| WRECK. &
Collision on Grand Trunk Road Ter
rible in Its Results.
THIRTY PERSONS WERE KILLED.
Thirty-Five Others Badly Injured
List of the Dead-Scores of Those
Hurt Suffer from Bitter Cold
Before Being Rescued.


London, Ont, Dec. 29.-Thirty per-
sons are known to have perished and at
least IS were injured in the wreck of
the Pacific express of the Grand
Trunk railway which crashed into an
east-bound freight at Wanstead Fri
day night. The express, rushing west
ward GO miles an hour, to make up
lost time, driving onward through
terrific blizzard, collided head-on with
heavy freight train. The express was
crowded with persons returning from
holiday visits in Canada. The day
coaches were ground to spLinters. Fire
started, and above the roaring of the
blizzard the shrieks of the injured,
pinned down under the shattered cars,
could be heard. The therm'o m e ter was
near zero, and before help could ar
rive many of the injured perished from
cold. The fire was extinguished be-
fore it reached any Of the injured, al
though the bodies of some of the dead
were blackened by fire.
The Dead.
Following is a partial and official
list of identified dead: Alex Stew
art, Petrolia, Ont; Mrs. Alex Stew
art, Petrolia, Ont; A. Ricketts,, Sar-
mia Tunnel, fireman; j. Gillies. Sar-
mia, tunnel engineer; Mrs. Trotter,
Petrolia, Ont; Mr.. Lawrence, Wat
ford, Ont; F. S. Freeman, Oil Springs
or Hensall, Ont; - Jeffrey, LoE-
don, Ont; Glenn Podley, Port Huron,
Mich; Gay Debenier, ticketed to La
Crosse, Wash.; DR.. Penwarden, tick
eted to Petrolia, Ont; woman, sup
posed to be Penwarden's wife; j. IL.
Brock, Brucefeld; O. B. Burwell, Port
Huron; Wilson Morton, Chicago; Mrs.
j. B. Barnes, Woodstock, Ont; Ed
ward Boyse, Prescott, Ont: Violet
Brock, Chicago; George Burkholder,
Sarnia, Ont; Alex Cameron, Petrolia,
Ont; Edward Debeau, Prescott, Ont;
Archie Douglass, Alviston, Ont; Mel
lie Geddes, Sarnia, Ont; Nicholas JEFF
frey, London, Ont; w. j. Lucas,
Strathroy, Ont; Lottie Lynch, Port
Huron, Mich; Mrs. Rodley, Port
Huron, Mich; three unidentified.
Failed to Deliver Orders.
According to Master of Transporter
ton Price, it was the agent and oper-
ator at Watford who failed to deliver
to the express train crew their orders
to pass the freight train at Wanstead.
The operator says he understood the
dispatchers to kill the orders for No.
8 to pass the freight at Wanstead, but
1t is denied in the dispatcher's Office
that the order was killed.
Andrew Carson, the operator at
Watford, the first station east Of the
wreck, whose failure to deliver orders
to Conductor McAulitfe, of the Pacific
express, to pass the freight at Wan
stead, is said by the Grand Trunk off,
cials to have caused the wreck, Sunday
afternoon made his first statement
since the wreck. He says he received
the order for No. s, the express, to pass
the freight at Wanstead at 9:4s o'clock,
but declares positively that few min
utes later Dispatcher J. G. Kerr, at
London, called him and ordered him
to "bust" or cancel the order. He
said: "About 1854, after calling Wyom-
ing and ascertaining that the freight
was there, the dispatcher called me
rapidly half dozen times. When l
answered on the wire, he told me to
"bust" this order. l wrote "bust it"
across the order just as No. was COM
ing in. Conductor McAuliffe came in
and asked me what the order board
was out against him for. I told him
that we had had an order for him, but
the dispatcher had busted it. He
asked me to hurry and write him a
clearance order, which I did. After
the train had started and was out of
my reach the dispatcher learned that
the freight had left Wyoming. told
him could not stop No. S, as it had left.
He Immediately began calling Kings
court Junction, the station between
Watford and Wanstead, on the rail-
road wire, and ! tried to raise them
on commercial wire. We both failed
to do this, however, until after the ex-
press had passed the junction.
Carson admitted that he knew it.
was against the rules of the company
to cancel train order without send
ing substitute for it, but said that
the dispatcher was his superior off,
Ger and he disliked to, question his
order or dispute his authority to take
this action Dispatcher Kerr's order
book in the local Grand Trunk office
does not show that the order was
"busted" or cancelled, as Carson
claims. According to the book, it was
still in force and should have been de-
ilvered to the conductor Of the ex-
press. Kerr has not mada. M