The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1906-12-20
MATTOX is BLAMED
FOR RECENT WRECK
INVESTIGATION BY SOUTHERN
DlSCLOSES FACT THAT HE VIO-
LATED SOME OF THE coMPANY'S
MOST IMPORTANT RULES.

Washington, December 19.-(Special)-
MI. Thorn of the Southern railway who
has with other officials been engaged in the
Investigation of the rear end collision,
which occurred near Rangoon station on
Thanksgiving morning, and in which Mr.
Spencer, the late president of the road.
and a number of others lost their lives,
was asked today whether any conclusion
had been reached as to the cause of the
accident.
YES. Train No. SO. bound south with
Mr.. Spencer's car, No. 100 ON the rear
end. had, by the block operator at Ran
sCon block station, G. ID. MattoX, been
let into the block between Rangoon and
the next block station to the south,
known as Lawyers. and, before the block
was cleared of that train MattoX also
let into the same block train No. 81
which, not knowing in time that train
No 50 was in the block, ran into 1t and
caused the catastrophe.
After passing Rangoon that morning,
train No. 49, which besides the engine and
tender consisted of a postal car, an eX-
press ear, combined baggage and sec
ond class passenger car. a first class car,
two sleeping cars and the president s
car, No. 100 (here named in their order
from the engne) at a point something
over mile from Rangoon station, sepa-
rated into two parts because of the part
ing of a coupling between the express car
and the combined car.
The emergency brakes at once applied
automatically on both sections of the
parted train, as intended in case of just
such contingencies, and both sections
we're stopped.
Under these circumstances, if the rules
OF the company had been obeyed, no other
train could have passed Rangoon or en-
tered the block in which this disabled
train was.
The undisputed testimony shows that no
less than three different rules of the
company were violated by MattoX. the OPP
orator at Rangoon, the observance of any
one of which would have prevented the
accident.
one of the rules CRule 11S) provides as
follows:
when a train enters the block the
signalman must give OS train No. -,
and the time to .ne next block station in
advance and when the train has passed
the nome block and the signalman has
seen the markers, he must display the
stop signal, and when the rear of the
train has passed 900 feet beyond the
home block signal he must give Be Cblock
clear of }, and the time to the next
block station in the rear.
"This information must be entered on
the block records.
The operator at Lawyers did not give
this information to MattoX, the operator
at Rangoon, as to train No. 50.
MattoX therefore, not having received
the required information in regard to the
movements of train No. SO, violated this
rule in regarding the block as clear Of
that train before letting in the following
train known as first 81.
His excuse is that the opera tor at Law
yers did report train No. % as "hy"
Lawyers, but failed to give him the time
it passed, as required by the rule. Thei .
is some confusion in his testimony as II
whether this occurred before first 81
passed Rangoon or just afterwards, but
the operator at Lawyers emphatically
denies that he sent any such message rs
claimed by MattoX and declares that
Mattox had never even informed him
that train No. 33 wanted the block or had
entered it.
While there exists this conflict of evil
dence, operator MattoX. in his own state
ment admits that he did not receive from
the oerator at Lawyers the time train SO
passed out of the block at Lawyers, and
excuses his failure to secure this informa-
ton by the statement that after the oper-
ator at Lawyers had informed him that
No. 80 was by he, the operator at
Lawyers, abruptly opened his key, aud