DRIVER MILBURN.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13105, 2 May 1908, Page 9

DRIVER MILBURN.

HIS TORTURES AND "H3S NiaHTMAliliS.

In a HtUe wooden, single-fronted cottngo at South Kensington, overlooking tho wastes of the "*i«h. Melbourne swamp, tbere are moving pictures-of huniau sufiering tnat must excite profound pity (wrote the Melbourne correspondent of the "Sydney Daily Telegraph"). The cottage is named "Ethel May," and it is the home of Robert Milburn, the driver of the first engine on tho Bendigo train —the locomotive that worked ail the slaughter. In the darkness of Tuesday morning, when willing hands were feverishly pulling out tilie mangled dead from between tiho Sunshine platforms, Miliburat -wee found eroucfling in tho cab of his eagino, broken in nerve and physically helpless. "No," he said, in reply to the doctor, who enquired whether he was hurt; "but it would have- been much better if I had been killed." Hβ was led- home, quivering in body and limb, and with benumbed senses. Ho was bruised about the loins, but of physical suffering, apart from his acute mental anguish, he had none. Throughout Tuesday the unfortunate man knew neither ea£c nor rest. Mis wife and members of his family tried to assuage hie suffering, but in vain. He walked the floor rapidly and ceaselessly, as if relief from thought were only to be obtained in physical action. Every now and then, as his distraught mind conjured up some awful moment in its maddening experience, he clutched his hands and groaned, ''My God; my Godl" It was prayer—prayer to the Almighty to put back His universe and giveliim. yesterday. To-day, after a bad night, he grew calmer; but on the advice of his doctor, no oae was allowed' to speak with him about the disaster, representatives of the Railway Department being refused interviews, like everybody else. During < intervals, Milburn was able to communicate to. his friends the particular phase of the tragedy that was racking his mind. It was not the agonies of the collision. His waking thoughts and the fiendish wraiths of his dreams all had relation to the moments lie lived at. half-past 10 o'clock on Monday night, immediately before his massive yO-tan engine crashed against the guard's van of the train from Balhirat. Ho alone, of all the hundreds who were in the vicinity of the station at that hour, saw, the hastening seconds before the terrible impact, and he alone realised beforehand the frightful consequences. He saw the glimmering of the tail lights of the Ballarat train ahead; ho saw the train itself j the saw tho people upom tho station platform; and he knew that the roaring mechanical monster on which he rode was wildly careering onwards to the shock like a mad thing, entirely beyond his control. The changing mental pictures that swept before his eyes all repeated themselves many -hours after tho accident, as they appeared with unnerving realism. . When Milburn attempted to describe the sensations of these few moments, mind and I speech failed him. (Milibajra is & strong, sturdy main, -who has hitherto Deen ■credited with tho possession of an iron nerve. He is €6 years of age, and. has a wife and seven children, most of them grown up. Hβ has. been in tho service of the Railway' Department for thirty-two "years, and for several yearj has been given charge of work -requiring the greatest experience, skill, amd norvo. He has been driving heavy engines that run express. Those who undortake this task are technically known in the service as "Hell-fire Jacks," not because of any recklessness,. but because of the daring speods at which they are compelled to travel. •