Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1907-01-07
BLUEWATER WRECK
TIES Up LINE
"a HOURS
NO ONE EVEN SERIOUSLY
INJURED IN OERAILMENT
Defective Rail or Broke
+. Flange Believed by Officials
to Have Been Cause of the
Disastrous SmaShup Of
Passenger Train No, 8,

The first train to pass the wreck of
Saturdays ea%stbound passenger train
No. s near Bluewater, was No. 4. the
Chicago limited of Saturday night.
which reached albuquerque at mid
night Sunday night, twenty-four hours
late. No. 4 was followed by No. . due
here Sunday morning and with the ar
rival late Monday morning of sun
day nights No. 4 traffic is practically
resumed on schedule. The wreck,
however, has not been cleared up, a
shoofiy having been built around the
long string of overturned cars which.
according to the passengers presented
a scene of the most inextricable confu-
sion. The heavy coaches and Pullmans
were thrown heller SHELTER on both
sides Of the track, most of them rolled
over on their sides or lying crosswise
OF the track down the steep embank-
ment where the wreck occurred. Tele-
graph poles were snapped off and
wires tangled up and things otherwise
mixed.
Probably the worst injured man on
the train was Mail Clerk Willard w.
Perkins, who hobbled off No. 2 Sunday
night with a cane, a bandaged eye and
a badly bruised leg. His injuries, how
ever, are slight and he considers him
self extremely lucky to be alive at all
after being rolled around in a mail
car.
J. c.. Craw, baggageman, was also
slightly hurt, his head and right leg
being bruised.
The wreck instead of being right at
Bluewater as at first reported occurred
112 miles west of Albuquerque and
about five miles west of Bluewater.
The engine pulling the train was No.
1921 in charge Of Engineer Van Eaton,
with Conductor Miller handling the
train. The engine did not leave the
rails as at first reported.
The following account of the wreck
was given the Morning Journal sun
day by a passenger in one of the tour
list cars:
The wreck occurred about dark.
We were making probably forty miles
an hour, being three hours and twenty
minutes late, The conductor had just
remarked to a Pullman conductor,
Well make Albuquerque by 8
o'clock when the crash came. | was
sitting i'm a seat facing a man and his
wife and a little child. All three were
torn from their seats and hurled across
the car, but the jolt didn't move me
from my seat. From all appearances
q bad wheel. broken hange or loose
rail caused the trouble. The engine
stayed on the rack. The first car
jumped the rails dragging the tender
off with it. The first car remained
coupled to the tender, although the
former went clear into the ditch end
wise. The combination MAJ Eand bag
gage car lit on one side Rcar's length
from the track. The smoker landed
IN its side a cars length from the
track on the north side. The chair car
and tourist sleeper were eapsized, but
were not thrown far from the rails.
The Pullman cars all left the rails. but
upright, or nearly so, at almost
right angles to the track and slanting
down the embankment, which was
nearly ten feet high
1.-TWO men in the smoker. n of
which was Conductor Wood. of the
Santa Fe, were hurled through a win
dow and alighted twenty Oh thirty feet
from the track. A private car con
the assistant superintendent of
telegraph and some other officials at
the rear end of the train stayed on
the rails"
Not one of the passengers was
hurt beyond a bad shaking up and a
slight bruises and there seemed to
be little excitement as the people be-
gan tIdWliIb bui lnt bboIS anu VIII
lows. / think it will take at least an
other tw~enty-four hours TO get the
main line clear. although the work is
being prosecuted with the utmost en-
BY the peculiar system of train an
bouncing on the Santa Fo, the east
bound trains were marked up at Vari-
hours, ranging from break
time in the morning to late last
night two and three hours at a jump,
when none Of the trains had passed
he wreck and it was not certain when
hey would get started. rs the scene
IF the wreck is only three or four
hours run from this city, travellers
Who waited for the trains all day yes
erday, are at loss to understand by
What system of figuring, for instance,
{ was computed az 3 o'clock they
reach here at 4:30 when they
not yet passed the wreck.
one baggage car with the end
smashed up considerably was replaced
IN the rails and brought in to this city
n the forenoon bearing a few of the
from the wrecked train.