Railway Adventures and Anecdotes: Extending over More Than Fifty Years
History
Railway Adventures and Anecdotes: Extending over More Than Fifty Years
Railroads
An American contemporary says:—“John Bull, of Galion (Ohio), ought to
have his name recorded in an enduring way, for few have ever behaved so
nobly as that engine driver of the New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio
railroad. As he was driving a passenger train last month he found that,
through somebody’s blunder, a freight train was approaching on the same
track, and a collision was inevitable. He could have saved his own life
by leaping from the engine, but, dismissing all thoughts of himself, he
resolved to try and save the passengers committed to his care. So he
reversed the engine and set the air-brakes, and then put on full steam,
started the locomotive ahead, broke the coupling attached to the train,
and dashed on to receive the shock of the collision. The passengers
escaped all injury, while the brave engineer was so badly hurt that he
died in a few hours. Such heroism as this should not go unnoticed.” The
_Cincinnati Inquirer_ says: “He remained in the car until the engine
leaped into the air and was dashed into the ditch, when he attempted to
spring to the ground, but had his foot caught between the frames of the
engine and tender, striking his head on the ground and causing the fatal
injuries. Railroad men say that the act of detaching the engine as he
did, not even derailing the baggage car with his engine at the high rate
of speed, and all in 150 feet, is without parallel in railroading. A
purse of 500 dollars was raised by the grateful passengers. The body has
been shipped to Galion for burial.”
AN INDUSTRIOUS BISHOP.
In noticing the “Life of the Rt. Rev. Samuel Wilberforce, D.D., Lord
Bishop of Oxford, and afterwards of Winchester,” a writer in the
_Athenæum_ remarks:—“Busy he was, both in Oxford and in London, and his
correspondence with all kinds of people was unusually large. A large
proportion of his letters were written in the railway train, and dated
from ‘near’ this town, or ‘between’ this and that. We remember to have
heard from one who was his companion in a railway carriage that before
the journey was half-finished the adjoining seat was littered with
envelopes of letters which he had read, and with the answers he had
written since he started. All this undeniably shows energy and
determination, and power to work.”
COOL IMPUDENCE AND DISHONESTY.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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