The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1911-07-11
New York, New Haven and
Hartford DE Luxe" Train
Jumps from Trestle in the
City of Bridgeport.
THINK DEATH LIST
MAY TOTAL TWENTY
AS Several Of the III Injured,
Are Reported Fatally Hurt
Careless Operator Said
to Be Cause.
S.Se.
(National News Association

(Natlcnat news ASSOcaattonD
Bridgeport, Conn. July 11.-Thir-
teen persons, eleven passengers and
two trainmen. were killed and forty
one passengers and one trainman in
jured, when the Federal Express from
Washington for Boston on the New
York, New Haven and Hartford Rail-
road plunged from an overhead trestle
to the pavement in Fairfield avenue.
this city. at $3.50 this morning
The Federal Express running at ap-
proximately fifty miles an hour, at
tempted to cross over from track No
2 to track No. 4. The engine. the Uni
ted States fish commission car, the
baggage car. a DAY coach, and three
sleepers plunged over the viaduct fill
ing Fairfield avenue with a mass of
wreckage. Two sleepers containing
enroute to Boston remained on the
track and the players in their bare
feet and pajamas did heroic work
Operator is Missing.
The operator in the tower who threw
the switch disappeared after the
wreck. The identity of the dead in
clude: Engineer A. M. Curtis, Fireman
w. A. Ryan. Charles Christie, Phila-
delphia; Mrs. George Rogers, wife of
Lieut.. Rogers, Washington; infant son
of Mrs. Rogers; George w. Saunders.
New London, Conn. Many of the injur-
ed who were taken to the three Bridge
port hospitals are fatally injured, and
1icf hn
wreckage quickly caught fire but the
policeman who had witnessed the ac-
cident Immediately sent in a general
alarm and fifty firemen prevented the
incineration of the injured adding to
the horror of the wreck.
The Federal Express was known as
a de luxe" equipment and consequent
ly the passengers were mostly promi-
nent people.
The wreck was caused by an open
switch. Confusion was so great that
it was impossible definitely to place
the responsibility for the accident,
but the railroad officials intimated that
it was due to the carelessness Of the
operator in the signal tower at the ov-
erhead crossing.
The Engineer Jumped.
The conductor of the wrecked train,
Michatel Furey. of New Rochelle, N.
Y, escaped with several cuts on his
head. The body of the engineer was
| found on the elevated structure along
side o fthe open switch. He had jump
ed only to be run over by the train.
Under the locomotive, which lay in
the street a mass of twisted junk, was
the body of the fireman. The splinter
ed remains of the Pullman day coach
the third car of the train held more
dead and injured than any of the 9TH
ers. In what had been the middle Of
the car rescuers found the bodies Of
! four men, woman and child piled In
| a heap. A second child lay crying on
| top of the mound of dead, apparently
! uninjured. Another woman in this car
| had lost an eye and was otherwise ter
| ribly injured. Her shrieks of anguish
| led the rescuers to the Gar which they
had to go down through an enormous
mass of wreckage to reach. Morphine
within a few minutes.
| A morgue was hastily improvised on
nearby lawn and the bodies were
laid out there and covered with sheets
from the sleeping car equipment. The
enormous mass of wreckage compile
| tely blocked Fairfield avenue, which
, is one of the main thoroughfares.