The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1911-07-05
Laid TO REST
Martial Rites for Confederate Prisoners
Of War at the North
DIED IN TRAIN WRECK
The Remains Of Seventy-Two South
ern Soldiers, Victims of Railroad
Disaster at the North During the
War Removed to the New York

Disaster at the North During the
War Removed to the New York
Cemetery
A dispatch from Lackawaxen, Pa,
says a wartime disaster, the terrible
shohola wreck in July, 1854, in
which more than 100 Confederate
prisoners and their Union guards
were killed, has been recalled by the
removal of the remains of the victims
of the wreck to Woodlawn cemetery,
New York, where they have been
reinterred with military honors.
The work has just been completed
under the supervision of Capt. Fen
ton, Second United States Cavalry,
and aide-de-camp to Gen. Frederick
D. Grant It was done under an act
OF congress which authorized the
government to have all Confederate
and Union soldiers killed during the
civil war removed to national Gem
eteries.
1t took three days to complete the
work of exhumation, place the re-
mains in boxes and ship them to New
York. This was done by a firm Of
Port Jervis undertakers. AS near as
they were able to estimate, 70 bodies
were recovered from the trench on
the Still farm at Shohola, on the
banks of the Delaware river, al
though the official estimate at the
time of the disaster gave the number
of killed as 81 Confederates and 1s
Union soldiers, many of whom died
later, number 123.
The trench in which the dead were
buried rs ieet was long, 8 feet wide
and feet deep, and as it was close
to the river, there have been re-
ports that some Of the dead were
washed away during spring freshers
but this is denied. .
Some relics were found during the
elimination, among which were two
combs, the heel plate of shoe, a
daugerreotype picture and part OF
the frame and glass, pipe, a pocket
book, razor, inkwell. bugle, the
ornament from soldiers cap, a gold
pin and many other triekets. There
was nothing, however, by which any
of the dead could be identified.
The wreck victims were part Of
a shipment of 10000 Confederate
prisoners from Point Lookout, Va, to
Elmira, N. Y, where prison camp
had just been made ready to receive
them. The Erie Railroad train on
which they were being conveyed
from Jersey City to Elmira contained
about 500 Confederate, guarded by
about .125 Union soldiers. It was
made up of emigrant cars, box and
cattle and all sorts Of odds and ends
That could be scraped together in the
railroad yards. The guards with
loaded muskets, were stationed on
the platforms at the ends of each car.
The train had left Jersey City
ahoit. 5 o'clock in the morning and
passed through the little Delaware
valley hamlet CT Shohola early in
t:e afternoon, noyine. at the rate OF,
25 miles an hour. About a mile west
of Shohola there was an awful crash.
followed by shrieks, grosns and walls
% anguish. A collision with heavy
coal train going. east on the same
s.nele track occurred on curve in
a deep cut liown locally as KIM
F"ller's nui. ::o::l locomotives rear
ed straight up in the air like crap
ping giants, the one jammed fast
against the other.
From the mass of tangled and
snlintered wreckage the bodies of the
rs or more prisoners and their guards
who were killed outright were taken
Many of the injured died before
nightfall and others fingered for a
time in neighboring farm houses and
other places nearby, where tempor-
ary HOSPITALS were established.
The fireman of the coal train was
killed, but TIE engineer escaped by
jumping. The engineer of the pris-
oners' train was caught in the wreck
of his locomotive, pinned against the
boiler and slowly roasted to death.
The survivors tried to rescue ht1h,
but the dying engineer warned them
away because of the danger that the
boiler might explode at any moment.
The wreck was caused by the mis-
take of Duff Kent, 2 telegraph oper-
ator, who was drunk while on duty
at this place, four miles west OF the
scene of the disaster. 1t was before
the days of double tracks, sen1a-
phores or automatic signals, and
when the coal train came down the
Homesdale branch from Hawley
bound for New York the conductor
asked the operator at Lackawaxen,
where the branch joins the main line,
if the track was clear, so that ne
might proceed east.