TERRIBLE RAILWAY ACCIDENT.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7719, 16 April 1887, Page 3

TERRIBLE RAILWAY ACCIDENT.

'Die following graphic account of the; recent terrible railway accident in America, conveys a realistic idea of the occurrence : —The train to which the accident happened was tliu regular Huston and Montrcul express. U was composed of n lnggagr. mail car, two passenger carriages, and two sleeping .carriugcß, whicli were filled with over a hundred: passengers. As the train was passing the wooden bridge thu passenger and sleeping' carriaged left the track, and fell on tho

frozen surface of tii'e liver iifty feet below. The carriages -caught fire instantly; from the stoves, . and Were s'6o.n completely wrapped iri flaiiiesj which also burned the bridge. Ont of eighty persons who were in tile carriages only ten. escaped unhurt, and between fifty and sixty were burned to. death. Thirty-nine bodies were soon recovered, nearly all charred beyond recognition. Many of the passengers were on their way to the Montreal Ice Carnival. It is believed, that ,the accident Was caused by the snapping 6i a rail Uirdugli the intense cold, since within three hours the thermometer had fallen from 2 below to 35 below zero. The scene after the accident was of the most fearful description. Nothing remained of the bridge except the stone piers ; while all that was left or the cars was the ironwork glowing with heat on the ice which the cars had not broken. One man was taken out charred to a cinder except one hand, which was not burned, owing to its being pinned down against the ice. The charred bodies and human fragments were placed in boxes for removal. At one time^ighteen such boxes, with their hideous contents, were ranged together on tile ice. Every train brought anxious searchers looking for theii\missing friends. The heat was so intense after the accident that those who escaped unhurt were unable to aid the imprisoned : victims,:who 'were burned' before their eyes. The ice was so thick that it could ■ not be broken to obtain water: . , . , ■„,,• Another account states that the train was an excursion express and that the low rates advertised had attracted about 125 passengers. . The Central .Vermont tailway crosses the .White. River, ..which divides that State from New Hampshire, upon a wooden bridge 65Off long. The engineer of the train had nearly crossed the bridge, when, looking backwards, he saw the four hind cars topple over, the . sido .of :the bridge,and fall a distance of 50ft .upon, the frozen river. Immediately, the stoves and broken : lamps, set fire, to the ruined, cars, and' the " debris' were 'a" mass of flame before any of the passengers could struggle out into an atmosphere of terrible cold. The straggles of the unhappy, victims were fearfully unnerving to those who had extricated themselves. One

man. who had got- out: unhurt returned to his wife, whom he could .touch 1 but not release, and perished 1 with her. . Some' were dragged out with their clothes in flames. Others tore off their garments in order to reduce themselves, to a size small enough to crawl through the apertures that afforded a chance ' of escape,' and fonnd themselves absolutely unprotected from the intense cold. Two boys, college companions, conversed together as they remained, pinned in immovable positions, awaiting the rapidly-advancing fire. The fire came, and set one free ; the other was consumed. Few of- the survivors have not some pitiful tales to tell of their escape, and of their terrific, struggles to rescue, with their naked hands, those who proved to be beyond human help their efforts were continued until the flames drove back- the would-be deliverers. • Within half an hour all was over, 'the

tragedy was complete, and the only evidence of the indescribable horror of the last thirty minutes lay in the charred fragments, the shapeless metal, and the glowing embers — all that remained of the bridge and the cars. The nearest houses were five miles away, and before help arrived from them the 'cold had increased

the number of the deaths. About thirty passengers who were in the forward part ]of the train' escaped unhurt ; of these in ■the rear cars seven suffered only slight in-, juries, and twenty-six wore seriously [injured. That gives a total of sixty,'threc who are believed to have escaped with their lives, and leaves a remainder of sixty-two who suffered in this terrible calamity. • ■ ; An examination of the bridge over the White River shows that about six feet of rail broke at a distance Ale about' twenty rods from tho commencement of the bridge. At this point there are marksori the ground and sleepers of a. wheel having gone off the line, thus giving conclusive evidence of the cause of the accident.