Bay View, NY Train Wreck

March 14, 1890

FATAL RAILROAD WRECK.

One Section of an Express Train Crashes Into the Other.

More Than a Score of Persons Killed or Injured.

Six persons have been killed and about twenty injured in a railroad accident on the Lake Shore road at Bay View, nine miles from Buffalo, N. Y., by the Chicago Express breaking in two, and the two sections then coming into collision.

The killed were:
MR. AND MRS. STEWART, of Rochester.
MRS. J. D. BAUCUS, Rome, N. Y.
J. SWAN, the colored porter.
JOHN W. FLYNN, of Canton, Ohio.
JOHN T. POWER, of Pittsfield, Mass.

The two sections of the wrecked train arrived at Buffalo about 1 o'clock in the morning with the dead and injured. The bodies were placed on trucks in the baggage room and the injured were removed to the hospitals or hotels.

Pullman Conductor FEST said the stream coupling broke in pulling out of Dunkirk, leaving them without steam. When near West Hamburg he made the startling discovery that the train had broken. He pulled the air-brake cord and found that it would not work. He ran to the third car and found, the air-brake there also useless. He was just turning the brakes when the crash came. The first section had, on finding that there had been a split, stopped, and the second section, going down grade, crashed into it. He yelled for the porter, and they went in and saw five persons pinned in the smoking room of the car Galena, and they helped them. Their escape was almost miraculous, as they got out with slight injuries.

The collision jammed the Galena right under the passenger coach in the rear, which was thrown on top of it. Of those in the Galena two were killed, nine injured, and one unknown man escaped.

One man was killed in the passenger coach, an Italian, name unknown, and J. SWAN, the colored porter of the Galena, was thrown thirty feet into a ditch and killed. Both legs and arms were broken, his chest stove in and his head smashed.

Porter WALDRON, (colored) of the Auburn, and Conductor FEST got out the exes and went to work to free the imprisoned passengers. The Galena was split into kindling wood, and nothing remained of it except the trucks and one side. The wreck started to take fire, when Porter WALDRON dashed into the wreckage, and at much danger to himself succeeded in extinguishing two lamps in the sleeper which were flaring up ominously. But for this timely action a number of persons would have perished in the flames.

One of the saddest incidents of the accident was that which befell JOS. D. BAUCUS, a bright young lawyer of Saratoga. A week ago MR. BAUCUS was married to a handsome young lady of Rome, N. Y. The happy couple had spent their honeymoon in the West and were returning home on the Galena. When the accident occurred the young lady was pinioned in the wreck. Her body was horribly bruised and her skull badly crushed. Her husband was injured about the legs and head. She was brought into a sleeper and the surgeons set about mending her wounds. Portions of the skull had to be taken out. The bridegroom was stretched out on another seat, two doctors working over him. Every few minutes he jumped up to get a look at his wife. The doctors restrained him by keeping him constantly informed of her condition but the suspense was too much for him. He jumped up and brushing the doctors aside, folded his arms about the dying woman's form. “She's cold,” he cried in despair, and he glanced up for a look of disapproval from the physicians, who stood by. “No she's living yet,” answered on of the doctors. The devotion of the broken hearted husband was touching in the extreme. He refused to be led away, and clung to the side of his unconscious wife, kissing her bleeding lips and urging the doctors on the further efforts. But medical skill proved unavailing. The wife died as the train was slowly rolling into Buffalo. MR. BAUCUS is completely prostrated.

E. E. STEWART, of Rochester, with his wife and eighteen months old baby, was in the day coach when the crash came. MR. STEWART was instantly killed. The baby was uninjured. She was found prattling in the arms of her dead mother, and crying “Mamma, mamma!” The ladies took her away and the little child fell asleep.

The Cranbury Press New Jersey 1890-03-14

Submitted & transcribed by Stu Beitler  Thank you, Stu!

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