The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-07-12
THE WRECK


 ble railroad wreck is placed upon an
 engineer, who; tinhappily1 being dead,
 cannot give his version of the story.
 The official statement of the New Ha-
 ven road is that Engineer A. M. Curtis
 caused the wreck by taking a cross
 over at 60 miles an hour which should have been taken at 15 miles an hour. Here again it would seem that the rules which govern railroading on paper will be found to be in conflict with the ordinary usages of practical railroading.
 True, Mrs. Curtis, the wife of the dead engineer. says that he had been overworked, in weather that was un- endurably hot.
 But no engineer physically able to drive his engine takes a crossover, which is a peculiarly short and dan gerous Kind Of switch, at 60 miles an hour. The life of the engineer is ever at stake, and he pays for error with his life. Curtis probably was the first victim of yesterday and perhaps was burned to death.
 More plausible. as matters stand, than that the engineer deliberately ran his train at high speed into a switch, is 1t that he had no adequate warning that the switch was open.
 1t is said that he fought to have known" that he would change tracks at this point. Did he know it? He was not the regular engineer on that train and on that trip. The train wasbehind time. more than an hour. It had been hurled onto track on which it did not habitually travel. It was hurled off again to disaster.
 An investigation should be had which will show the whole chain of circumstances as far as the facts can be obtained. Who gave the order to 20 onto the freight track, in order that the train might, make speed, and when? Who gave the order that the train should again change tracks, and when2 When and where was En- eineer Curtis warned that he would change tracks at the Fairfield avenue tower. How were the signals set as | he approached the tower and when were they set?
 These are a few of the facts that sbould be obtained by investigation. l The inquiry should be public in quiry.
 The railroad commission has ceased to exist The public utilities commits sion has not como into being. It will | not have retroactive powers with re- spect to a wreck that took place be- fore it existed. Therefore the only tribunal under Connecticut authority to make an immediate inquiry is that represented by the coroner.
 But, unfortunately, Coroner Wilson has made a practice of holding his inouiries star chamber, that is to say, in secret.
 His inquiry into the wreck of June 6. in which five lives were lost, was secret. His finding fixed the blame upon the engineer, just as the engineer in the present case is blamed. The evidence showed that the danger sig nal was unlighted, but the coroner did not fix the responsibility for this neglect, and instead laid enormous emphasis upon a chain of circum- stances tending to show that the en- gineer was either asleep at his post. dead or otherwise incapable. Never theless there were two men in the cab with the engineer.
 Because the inquiry was secret the public, in whose interest the machin- cry of investigation is maintained, is still in the dark as to the cause. The coroner was deprived of the light that might have been thrown into the case through the advice and counsel of those whose attention would have been attracted by public declaration Of the evidence.
 Moreover there is an inherent im- propriety in secret Investigations, where the public stands upon one side and a powerful private interest upon the other
 The impropriety is so apparent, it is surprising it has not attracted the at- sention of Coroner Wilson before this.
 He may have perfect confidence in his own powers to do justice even though the railroad is the fountain of honor in Connecticut and the source through which many political honors are said to flow
 But the public likes to be shown. It does not want to take upon trust mat ters involving the life and limb of those who use the modern means of