WRECK FATAL TO SOLDIER
Florida Service Man Dies In
Seaboard Catastrophe
SEALS, GA., Dec. 14.—AP—Death of a soldier identified
as Hubert A. Dion of West Key West. Fla., raised to two the number of
fatalities in the wreck of the Seaboard Air Line Railways passenger, the
Sun-queen, near here Sunday night.
Railway officials said Dion, whose Army unit was not identified, died a
few hours after five coaches were detailed and three turned over.
Also killed was Pvt. Roy Stinson of Jacksonville, Fla., who was attached
to the 508th Parachute infantry unit at Camp Mackall, N.C. He was thrown
through a window of an overturned coach
Twenty-two other persons were injured, none seriously.
NOTE: Research of this accident has shown at
least three geographic location being named --- Seals, GA, Lumberton,
NC, Buie, NC and Rennert, NC.
The vicinity of the small town of Buie, approximately
25 miles SE of Fayetteville, appears to be the most accurate area for
the incident whereas other localities were probably named either in
confusion or as areas whose names were more readily recognized by the
general public. |
Seventy-Nine Known Killed in Lumberton Train Crash.
Workers Seeking Other Bodies With Torch.
 Lumberton, Dec. 17. -- (AP) - The toll of dead in the Southeast's worst railroad disaster mounted to 79 today, including 47 soldiers, as more bodies were located in four telescoped passenger, cars that still blocked the Atlantic Coast Line's double-track mainline from New York to Florida.
The Red Cross at Atlanta said bodies of 47 soldiers and 20 civilians had been recovered and that seven more bodies were known to be in one of the cars and five in another.
The four steel cars, stacked one on the other, were so jammed together that they were little bigger than one car is normally. The wrecking trains were able to move the pyramided coaches only six feet all night.
The double pileup of the two crack flyers produced a death list just short of that in the wreck of the Congressional Limited in Philadelphia last September when 80 persons lost their lives.
The Southeastern seaboard's worst previous train wreck occurred at Rockmart, Ga., in 1926, when 20 were killed. The biggest wreck toll in the nation's railroad history is 145 killed at Nashville, Tenn., July 9, 1918.
Workers toiled throughout the night and continued today in 12 degree weather to clear the tracks and remove the dead.
C. G. Sibley, vice-president of the Coast Line, today put the time of the derailment of No. 91, the southbound train, at 12:50 a. m. Northbound Train No. 8 struck the derailed cars between 1:25 and 1:30 a. m., Sibley said,
"Our information is that the fireman on Train 91 went ahead of his train to flag the northbound train, but did not succeed in stopping the train with his red lantern," the spokesman said in a statement. "He had a fuse but he stumbled and fell and it brake [sic] and he used his lantern."
"The engineer on No. 8 evidently did not see the fireman's signal. We understand that the sleet and snowstorm was still in progress at that time.
The flagman on 91 went back to protect trains following
on the southward track." "A formal investigation will be
held to develop the facts with respect to the action of
the crews of both trains." Earlier, the toll of dead -
48 servicemen and 21 civilians - was announced by
Atlantic Coast Line railroad headquarters at Wilmington.
Upwards of 50 persons were injured, many seriously.
Enough of the mass of telescoped cars and twisted rails
was expected to be moved today to permit resumption of
normal traffic. Some civilians dead were still
unidentified. Witnesses said a few victims were so
dismembered it would be difficult to establish identity.
|
Names of the soldier dead were withheld pending
notification of kin. A broken rail, A.C.L. Officials
said, caused the first wreck -- the derailment of three
coaches of the Florida-bound Tamiami West Coast
Champion. One person, First Lt. ROY A GRIFFIN, a student
chaplain at Harvard university, was killed in this
wreck. This was at 12:50 a. m. Some 35 minutes later the
northbound Tamiami East Coast Champion ploughed into the
derailed coaches of the first train. Magazine publisher
William Wood, a passenger on the first train and
eye-witness of the second wreck, said five cars of the
northbound train "leaped the track and folded together
like an accordion." "It was like a bad dream, filled
with screams, and in the dark you couldn't see what had
happened," he added. He told of an expectant mother,
whose legs and thighs were badly mangled and who kept
saying, "I won't lose my baby, God help me, I won't."
"She had more spunk than I've ever seen in a woman
before," he said. "After a doctor came up and examined
her and gave her a sedative, and told her that her baby
would be born. "Thank God," she said. First arrivals at
the scene told of the injured crying "Shoot me!" "Kill
me!" and begging for help and water. The trains were
crowded with holiday travelers. Scattered about the
wreck were packages in Christmas wrappings, Army
blouses, Marine coats, and broken Christmas toys. One
spectator reported seeing a white satin dress and white
veil, evidently the wedding dress of some passenger.
After the first derailment, some of the passengers built
bonfires of newspapers to stop two southbound freight
trains. They frantically endeavored by the same means to
warn the northbound engineer, without succeeding. Many
of the service men were en route to their homes for the
holidays. Those who were not injured pitched in and
helped in the rescue work and declined to board a relief
train sent from Florence, S.C. From army bases in the
area, ambulances, wrecking crews, doctors, nurses and
medical units sped to the scene before dawn.
Laurinburg-Maxton Air Base sent a detachment of 40 men
with acetylene torches and jacks, and it was their work
which opened the way for the rescue of many trapped
under the steel wreckage. One railroad official said an
automatic warning device on the parallel track did not
operate when the southbound train's three cars were
derailed because the cars did not fall over completely
on the second track, and consequently failed to set off
the signal. Of the injured, 15 were taken to a
Fayetteville hospital, 30 to Lumberton hospitals,
several to a Florence, S. C., hospital and the injured
service men were taken to base hospitals at
Laurinburg-Maxton Air Base.
The Burlington Daily Times News North Carolina 1943-12-17
|
Lumberton, Dec. 17. -- (AP) - The toll of dead in the Southeast's worst railroad disaster mounted to 79 today, including 47 soldiers, as more bodies were located in four telescoped passenger, cars that still blocked the Atlantic Coast Line's double-track mainline from New York to Florida.
The Red Cross at Atlanta said bodies of 47 soldiers and 20 civilians had been recovered and that seven more bodies were known to be in one of the cars and five in another.
The four steel cars, stacked one on the other, were so jammed together that they were little bigger than one car is normally. The wrecking trains were able to move the pyramided coaches only six feet all night.
The double pileup of the two crack flyers produced a death list just short of that in the wreck of the Congressional Limited in Philadelphia last September when 80 persons lost their lives.
The Southeastern seaboard's worst previous train wreck occurred at Rockmart, Ga., in 1926, when 20 were killed. The biggest wreck toll in the nation's railroad history is 145 killed at Nashville, Tenn., July 9, 1918.
Workers toiled throughout the night and continued today in 12 degree weather to clear the tracks and remove the dead.
C. G. Sibley, vice-president of the Coast Line, today put the time of the derailment of No. 91, the southbound train, at 12:50 a. m. Northbound Train No. 8 struck the derailed cars between 1:25 and 1:30 a. m., Sibley said,
"Our information is that the fireman on Train 91 went ahead of his train to flag the northbound train, but did not succeed in stopping the train with his red lantern," the spokesman said in a statement. "He had a fuse but he stumbled and fell and it brake [sic] and he used his lantern."
"The engineer on No. 8 evidently did not see the fireman's signal. We understand that the sleet and snowstorm was still in progress at that time.
The flagman on 91 went back to protect trains following
on the southward track." "A formal investigation will be
held to develop the facts with respect to the action of
the crews of both trains." Earlier, the toll of dead -
48 servicemen and 21 civilians - was announced by
Atlantic Coast Line railroad headquarters at Wilmington.
Upwards of 50 persons were injured, many seriously.
Enough of the mass of telescoped cars and twisted rails
was expected to be moved today to permit resumption of
normal traffic. Some civilians dead were still
unidentified. Witnesses said a few victims were so
dismembered it would be difficult to establish identity.
