Little Falls herald. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1889-1950, 1903-02-06
TWENTY a RE KILL ED
ENGINEER HELD REePoNsleLE
FOR o'sAsTRous NEW JER-
II sEY WRECK. r; +

Victims Were Principally WeH!to-0o
Residents at Piainnssd, NJ. j. Re-
turning From Their Places Of Bust.
ness in New York city-Fire Breaks
Out in the WreeAaes and Some Of
the Bodies Are Unreeosnizabie.
New York, Jan. 29.-The total loss
Of life by the f-ightful collision on the
Central Railroad of New Jersey at
Graceland, N. j., is up to twenty. In
addition to these. Engineer Davis and
Fireman Mccarthy of the Philadelphia
and Reading express. who are in the
hospital at Plainfleld. may die at any
moment, and it Is believed that several
Of the injured passengers cannot re-
cover. The number of those known to
be injured is upward OF fifty, of whom
thirteen remain in the hospital:
The blame for the accident is placed
by the officials of the Jersey Central
on w. E. Davis, engineer Of the Phila-
delphia and Reading express, and &C.
cording to policeman who took Davis
from the smashed up cab of his engine
Davis admitted that he had taken
chances and disregarded the danger
signals displayed because he expected
to see the red and green lights change
to white as he neared them. They did
not change, but it was too late to stop
and in an instant almost the crash
came, carrying death to more than a
score of human beings.
The scenes following the wreck were
unusually horrible, because the cars
were splintered almost to kindling
wood by the force Of the collision, hot
Goals from the engine fire box poured
out and the wood was soon burning
ferceiy What hope there had been OF
rescuing the wounded in tie last car
of the local express had to be given up
as the flames spread and undoubtedly
some CT the wounded, who were imprls-
oned by the piled up debris, were
burned to death.
Plainfie!d Mourns for Many.
Most of the passengers on the local
express, on which all of those killed
were riding, were well-to-do residents
Of PlainIeld, n. J., and neighboring
towns, who were returning to their
homes from their places of business
in New York. OF the identified dead
seven lived in Plainfield and in the
long list of injured Plainfield is given
as the home of majority.
The local express train that was run
into leaves New York at 5:45 p. m. and
runs to Bound Brook. It stops at
Elizabeth, Westfield and Plainfield and
beyond Bound Brook is run as local.
The through express which crashed
into the local express leaves New York
fifteen minutes later, but travels at a
higher rate of speed. 1t stops only at
Elizabeth. The slower train switches
from track No. 3 at Graceland to track
No. 4 and the through express should
pass the local at that point. After the
through express passed the other train
returns to the express track.
During the evening freight train
occupied track No. and the local eX-
press was ordered to continue on the
express track as far as Dunellon and
then switch onto track No. 4. Soon
after receiving the order the local ex-
press had to stop to allow hot box to
cool Off The local had just started
and was going at a slow rate of speed
when the Philadelphia and Reading
express came along and ran into the
local train.