Monon - miscellaneous articles - Montgomery InGenWeb Project

This morning at half past nine o’clock the through freight train on the Monon which was running without orders pulled out from the Monon station at a lively rate. The train, a heavy one, with several cars loaded with Bedford stone started wildly down the steep grade to the Red Bridge. Engineer Spoor and firemen Boriff suddenly sprang up with a yell of terror as they cleared the Black Hills and saw, shooting toward them from the north, the local freight, ¾ of a mile away across the Red Bridge, but under a heavy head of steam and, like themselves on a down grade. The bridge is the foot of both the steep grades and the engines swet steadily toward each other and inevitable disaster. Engineer Spoor reversed his engine in vain, but “Dad” Henderson, of the local, saw the things in a different light. One of the oldes engineers on the road, his sharp eye took in the situation at a glance. He saw that if the engines maintained their then relative rates of speed that the disastrous collision would occur right on the Red Bridge, 30’ above the deep and swollen creek. Turning to fireman, Sam Coddington, he ordered him to crowd on all steam and opening up his engine’s valves he sent the iron monster rushing down the grade to destruction. The bridge fairly shook as the heavy mass swept over it but the end was accomplished and the caboose was clear of the bridge several feet when the crash came. Both engineers and firemen jumped except Henderson who was lame and unable to lep until he picked a clear place and shot from his cab window at the moment of the collision. The local was moving much faster than the through freight but that was a heavier engine and backed by cars loaded with stone so that when the engines met they both reared upon the hind trucks and impelled by the great force within themselves went through each other and toppled over down the east side of the high embankment, a shapeless mass of twisted iron. The heavily laden cars behind them came on and fared a like fate, the trucks falling on the west side as a rule and the bodies of the cars on the east side with the engines. Fourteen cars were demolished thus before the great force spent itself.  None of the other cars left the track except the caboose of the local which bounced like a rubber ball several feet in the air and fell on its sheels on the ties, nearly jarring the life out of its occupants. Those on the cabooses quickly rushed out and ran toward the mass of ruins from which the escaped steam from the boilers arose on the frosty air in great white clouds, obscuring the wreck from sight but presenting a gruesome spectacle. From out this bank of steam came the agonized squeals of a car load of fattened hots some of which were being slowly scalded to death by the escaping steam.  The jolted and bruished engine crews sat on the ground just outside the ruin and stared around them in a stunned and dazed manner. They soon regained their senses, however and assisted the others in the search for engineer Henderson. As soon as the steam cleared away they entered the wreck and found him under his own engine, badly hurt, but strange to say, alive, he having been protected by the timbers which fell across his engine and kept the other debris from crusing him. He was quickly pulledout and after examination by the company’s surgeon was placed in a cab and taken to the city. His thigh is broken, his head fearfully cut and probably some internal injuries sustained so it is impossible to state just the extent of his hurt. OD Thomas, of Linden, a passenger on the local, was hurt about the head and legs, CL Long was hurt in the back and brakeman Mordell of the through freight was badly injured about the legs. All were bruised and banged up but outside of “Dad” Henderson no one was dangerously injured. The wreck was complete and on the demolished engines lay dead hogs, broken barrels of cement, stove, stone and bags of mill feed in reckless profusion. The loss will be enormous and will range all the way from $35,000 to $50,000 the whole thing of course to be borne by the railroad company.  It was one of the most disastrous wrecks from a financial standpoint that has occurred on the Monon for some time. As soon as the smoke cleared away and the damange disclosed conductor Brissenden of the through freight and conductor Blankenship of the local walked down to agent Watson’s office and made out their reports which were quickly fired in to headquarters. The through freight was running without orders and of course had thus the right of way. The accident accordingly lay with the crew of the local and resulted from a wrong reading of orders which were given at Lafayette. There conductor Blankenship received an order which contained the following sentence: “Meet 2nd 74 at Crawfordsville.” The abbreviation “2nd” was written illegibly. Blankenship and Henderson read it “No. 74” which train they usually meet at Cherry Grove. The train “2nd 74” was way below Crawfordsville at the time of the accident. In some way the local crew seemed to forget all about the through freight No. 74 and went rushing on thinking the track was clear to Crawfordsville, or else they thought “No. 74” was late and awaited them there. It was a very natural mistake as The Journal, which was shown the mistaken order, can bear witness. The wrecking train which was at Bloomington was telegraphed for at once.

Notes: The road will make a rigid investigation to determine the blame lies. Ever loafer and ever chippy in town visited the scene of the disaster before noon. Everybody went out after dinner. Nicholson photographed the scene of the wreck this morning and numerous views were taken by the owners of Kodaks.  “Dad” Henderson, the injured engineer, was taken to the house of his old friend, HS Watson, the Monon agent.  His injuries are very serious. The wrecking train arrived this afternoon and is now at work. It will require 12 hours to make the track open for train, although the wreck most of it fell clear down the embankment.  Several enterprising citizens cut the throats of the hogs which were merely wounded and laid in a supply of winter’s meat.  A number of the porkers escaped uninjured and are now scattered all over the county. The south bound mail train left the Monon at Linden, went to Clark’s Hill over the Clover Leaf, to Colfax on the Big Four and to Crawfordsville on the Vandalia. The north bound went over the same route to reach Lafayette. Both trains lost considerable time in this way.