The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-06-02
FIEND|SH MURDER OF GAR CONDUCTOR No Trace Is Found of Guilty
 Men VICTORIAN TELLS STORY Owes His own Life to Fact That Shot gun In the Hands of High
 wayman Refused to
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VICTORIAN TELLS STORY
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murder of Conductor J. z. Grimes early yesterday morning at the Louisville and Nashville railroad crossing in East Thomas on the North Ensley car line, while apparently, like a hundred other murders in Jefferson county, the mur- derers will never be caught.
 Grimes was conductor on the last car which left Ensley for Birmingham, while J. E. Borough was motorman, the car leaving Ensley at 12:49 a. m. The crime was evidently committed solely for robbery. while the highwaymen were white men. Borough owes his life entirely to the snapping of the shotgun used by the robbers.
 It was about 1:1O a. m when the deed was committed, but report of it did not reach Birmingham until 3:45 o'clock. while slow work on getting bloodhounds to the scene prevented any discovery of the criminals in this man. ner. It was after o'clock before the dogs were put on the trail and by this time large number of people had been passing about and destroyed the scent The trail was followed for a short dis tance.
 The last passenger on the car had been let off at Church street, some dis tance from the scene of the sh shooting. At the crossing Grimes swung off the front platform to flag the car across and a gun was heard to snap.
 Grimes still had his hand on the car rail when the gun snapped loud and stooping he said to me, Look there, Billy, then the gun was fired and Grimes fell in a heap" was the way in which Motorman Borough described the affair T jumped from the car and was trying to pick him up, He was groan- ing terribly at the time, when the gun
 snapped again. It snapped loud and seemed to say death to me. I sprang
 back on the platform and reached for my controller it being my intention to
 run the car back to Pratt City, Then
 the gun snapped again and I jumped
 into the car and between two seats could see two men on the outside and as hid one of them boarded the car and pointed a double -barrelled shotgun downward toward me, and again the | gun snapped. I seized the end of the
 barrel and we struggled up and down
 the car. While the man was a little
 shorter than me he was much heavier | and stronger and in a few minutes he
 broke my grip on the gun.
 Again he pointed the gun at me and
 dash ed out of the car and off of the l rear platform. the gun snapping again as I jumped off the car. I dashed over fn but l | then tried another house with the same
 result. Then I ran into the woods and | started over to Sayreton mines. After | l had been in the woods a long time | heard train coming and went back to | the crossing, reaching there just as
 the freight train pulled up. Grimes had been lying on the ground when left
 but was in the car when l came back" Engineer Alpin was running the
 Louisville and Nashville freight train
 and stopped when he saw a darkened
 electric car standing directly over the | crossing He jumped out of his cab
 and investigated, then talked to Moto-
 man Borough, who came up in the
 meantime. Going to the freight station | a few yards away Engineer Alpin
 broke into 1t and telephoned to Bir-
 min gham special car bearing Street | Car Dispatchers Morris and Dolan and
 employees of the street car company, l rushed to the scene, while the sheriff s office was notified.
 ! Grimes body was found lying l spra wled across the aisle of the car. | face downward, pockets turned wrong
 side out. The load of shot had entered
 the back of his head and his face was | lying in pool of blood, while his
 shirt and sleeves were bloody. By his
 side was his watch chain, it being the
 only valuabl thing which the robbers | had left. His coat and cap had been
 taken away
 | The place where the robbers had stood
 when they first fired was plainly discern l ible. There are a number of railroad | tracks at this point some paraleling the 1 electric track and others running in a
 diagonal direction and crossing the car
 rails. The road bed is built of cinders, | there being large ditch between the car tracks and Louisville and Nashville l tracks about 15 feet from the car track | The highwaymen had stood on the back | of the ditch and fired.
 l Grimes fell close to the car track, his | blood spattering the ground, a small | piece of old broom lying on the ground | being turned entirely red by it. His punchers fell on the ground, while the wad from the gun shell was lying | close by.
 
 l frs office in reaching the bloodhound kennels in Woodlawn by telephone, and deputy was finally dispatched to them l on horseback special car being held in readiness to take them to East Thom- as. It was 6:30 clock before they had reached the scene. Efforts to secure dogs | from other places were begun after 5 o'clock and in a short while a pack of dogs were on the scene from No. prison of the Tennessee company.
 | These dogs took 0 trail, which was fol- lowed for some distance. Another pack of dogs from Ensley arrived a few min utes afterward and took a trail in an opposite direction, which was later found | to have been the direction in which Mo- | torman Borough had gone. The coat, hat envelope and other papers belong | ing to Grimes wer found short distance | from the crossing on the first trail taken. The trail, however, played out a short
 distance beyond.
 Had Borough taken the opposite side of the track than the one he took when running from the car he could have se- cured help and sounded the alarm in- l stantly Within less than 200 yards from the crossing are the homes occupied by the officials connected with the Thomas furnaces. each of which has telephone in 1t.
 While Borough had a revolver in his pocket he never thought of using 1t when the highwaymen entered the car He struggled desperately over the robber' 3 shotgun and both of his forearms were badly skinned during the encounter. He stumbled down a ditch after leaving the car and severely wrencbed his back and