The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1907-07-25
80 PEOPLE DEAD AND
TO OTHERS ARE HURT
Freight and Excursion Trains Come
Together.
SPEEDING FIFTY MILES AN HOUR.
Disaster on the Pere Marquette Rail-
road Near Detroit, Mich, Due to
Coal Train Disregarding Orders to
Wait for Excursion Train. Which
Had the Right of Way.

Salem, Mich. Especially Thirty
people are dead and more than 70
injured, many OF them seriously, as
the result OF head-on collision be-
tween this village and Plymouth,
when a Pere Marquette excursion
train, bound from Ionia to Detroit,
crashed into a westbound freight In
cut located at q sharp curve of
the Pere Marquette Railroad, about
mile east OF Salem.
The passenger train of IL cars,
carrying the Pere Marquette shop
employees of Ionia and their families
to the Michigan metropolis for their
annual excursion was running at high
speed, probably so miles an hour,
down a steep grade. 1t struck the
lighter locomotive of the freight
train with such terrific force as to
turn the freight engine completely
around.
The wrecked locomotives lay side
by side both headed eastward. Only
q few of the freight trains cars were
smashed, and 1t was only a few
hours work to remove all traces of
them from the scene. But behind
the two wrecked locomotives six cars
OF the passenger train lay piled in
a hopeless wreck. Four of the pas
Benger coaches remained on the track
undamaged and we're used to con-
vey the dead and injured to Ionia,
one coach was entirely undamaged,
with only its forward trucks off the
rails. These were the rear five cars.
The two coaches next ahead of these
were telescoped. The next car for
ward stood almost on end after the
wreck, its forward end resting on
the roadbed and the rear end high
in the air upon the two telescoped
coaches that had been following It.
Two coaches were thrown cross
wise of the track, and lay suspend
ed from bank to bank of the cut,
Ave or six feet above the rails. OF
the baggage car not enough remain
ed to show where it had been tossed.
Portions of the baggage car and of
the locomotive tenders and freight
cars were piled in an indescribable
mass of debris upon the top of the
10-foot high embankment.
James Boyle, a farmer, was work
ing in a field probably 400 feet away
from the track when the two trains
approached from opposite directions
The local freight was moving slowly
up the heavy grade. and had just
reached the curve, when the pass
enger train appeared running at high |
speed. Farmer Boyle saw the pass
enger engineer shut off steam and |
apply air brakes. and saw the crews |
of both engines jump just before the |
crash. He ran to the tracks, whore |
he found the uniniured passengers !
from the rear coaches running for
ward and Joined with them in pull
ing out the injured, who could be
seen on every hand. The dead were
placed in a row alongside the track,
and the injured were made as COM |
Portable as possible until the arrival |
of wreck trains from Saginaw, De-
troit and Grand Rapids made it inn
possible to send them to Ionia ana |
Detroit. The 2S dead bodies first |
taken from the wreck were shipped
to Ionia and the injured were placed |
on two trains, one of which headed |
for Detroit and the other for Ionia.
There were about 35 injured peo-
pie on each train Later in the day
the body of Ed Corwan, the head
brakeman of the passenger train,
was taken out of the wreck. Fire
man Knowles died on the relief train
en- route to Detroit. bringing the
list of dead to 80, with a possibility
that more bodies might be found in
the wreckage and that several of the
injured may die.
The responsibility is put squarely
up to the crew of the freight train
by officials of the road. Officials who
arrived at the scene of the wreck
soon after the accident, secured from
the crew of the freight the orders
under which it was running and
which clearly showed the position of
the passenger excursion train and
that the freight had encroached mp
ON the other trains running time