Accident
A train consisting of seven cars left Atlantic City over the West Jersey Railroad bearing a special excursion of members of the Improved Order of Red Men and their friends from Bridgeton and Salem, New Jersey, and had reached the crossing of the Reading Railroad when it was struck by the 5:40 down express train from Philadelphia. Two cars were demolished and the two cars following were telescoped.
The engine of the Reading train was wrecked, the engineer killed, and the fireman injured fatally. The car behind it was thrown from the track and many of its occupants were killed or injured.
During 1896, leaving Atlantic City, the tracks of the West Jersey Road were parallel to those of the Camden and Atlantic Railway until they crossed the drawbridge, when they switched off to the south, crossing the Reading Road at an oblique angle.
John Greiner, the engineer of the West Jersey train, saw the Reading train approaching the crossing at a swift speed, but as the signals were open for him to proceed on his way, he continued. His engine had barely cleared the crossing when the locomotive of the Reading train, which left Philadelphia at 5:40 pm, struck the first car full in the centre, throwing it far off the track in a nearby ditch, and submerging it completely. The second car of the West Jersey train was also carried into the ditch, the third and fourth cars being telescoped. The engine of the Reading train was thrown to the other side of the track, carrying with it the first coach.
A few minutes after the collision, the boiler of the Reading locomotive exploded, scalding several people to death and casting boiling spray over many of the injured passengers.
Read more about this topic: 1896 Atlantic City Rail Crash
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—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)