Show RAILROAD WRECK A Terrible Crash on the Iron MountainlEoad DEATHS DOINGS ON SUNDAY The RevoltThe StrIkeAn Extra Session Wrecked Beating the RecordOther News Items Railroad Wreck ST Louis March 6The railroad accident on the Iron Mountain Railroad near Desoto Mo which was briefly referred to late last night while not being at all unusual in regard to the fatal casualities proves to have been quite remarkable in respect to several circumstances which attended it It occurred at Victoria thirty miles south of here a little after 10 oclock and was occasioned by the giving way under the train of a trestle which crossed Joachim Creek at that point The train was the Texas express and consisted of baggage express and mail cars smoker two passenger pas-senger coaches and four sleepers carry ing about 130 passengers Heavy ram had fallen all day and the creek was much swollen At Hematite the first station this side of the trestle the engineer received orders to run cautiously as the rain had been heavy and the creek was out of its banks Engineer Kelly says he ran slowly beyond that point and both he and his fireman William Hatch watched the track very carefully As he approached the trestle Kelly observed that the track was entirely straight and level without the slightest fear or hesitation but when his engine reached about the middle of the trestle he felt the whole structure sinking beneath him In an i instant he opened the valve operating the air brakes to the full width and brought the train to so quick a stop I that the front end of one of the end cars was crushed in by the sudden I shock This saved the coaches but the I baggage mail express and smoking I cars went into the raging torrent below carrying with them all the men onboard on-board Engineer Kelly and fireman I Hoch went down with the engine and were submerged in the flood Kelly in i his struggles to free himself found that I oneof Ijis feet was fast and at the same instant and Just as he realized that he must drown the engine turned over and i his foot was released and he came to the surface Seizing a passing log he I I clung to it desperately and was swept down the torrent and lodged against a tree 150 yards below with scarcely i strength enough to move He clasped I his legs and arms around a limb of the tree became unconscious and was not I restored until two or three hours after i he had been taken from the tree when he found himself kindly cared for in a house in Victoria His face and head were severely cut Two of his toes were cut from one of his feet and he was badly bruised in various parts of his body Fireman Hatch was carried about 500 yards downthestreamlodged ia a mass of brush or drift and was rescuedsoon after the flood subsided The postal car was swept away some distance and as the water rushed through it from end to end the mail was literally washed out and it is now scattered over miles of territory or imbedded in the mud of the creek It is regarded as an almost total loss the whole of it being completely soaked and the addresses of letters obliterated Postal clerks McCallough Shaffer and Ryan were badly bruised and almost drowned and being stripped for work they lost all their clothes their gold watches and about 5250 in moneywhich were carried away by the flood The smoker which is said to contain some twenty persons was swept down about 300 feet below the trestle and all its occupants are believed t > to have been saved They succeeded in getting outside out-side of the car and clung to its top until they were rescued There are some doubts regarding the baggage man and express messenger being saved but a late despatch from the wreck says that none ot the train men were lost The cause of the unprecedented flood is believed to have been a cloud burst which took place late in the evening and filled the creek which runs between the rugged hills for miles so full that it became a raging torrent with a current I of over twenty miles an hour and swept everything before it A full list of the casualties cannot be obtained but aside from Henry Byron of Jamestown N Y who was found drowned in the smoker and Byrnes a brakeman who had a foot cut off none other than those mentioned above were in any way seriously injured Nearly one half of those in the smoker lost most of their clothes they being torn from their persons either getting out of the car or by the rushing water through which they were dragged ashore by a rope A farmer named Andrew White of Baileys Station did heroic work in saving the passengers he having swam several times to the smoker and each time returned with one of the unfortunates who were cling ing to the roof of the car Several passengers pas-sengers in the sleepers also aided materially ma-terially in the work and Conductor Green of the train and all of the train crew labored like Trojans in rescuing those in the cars The mail is said to have been the largest ever sent over the road and the loses will fall heavy on this city where about threequarters of the matter originated An express package without address or anything on it by which it can be identified containing 37000 was found today and it is not unlikely that others will be discovered in the creek or in the woods j |