A RAILWAY HERO.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume III, Issue 525, 4 January 1882, Page 2

A RAILWAY HERO.

A story of courage from Arizona is worth reproducing. A loaded railway. !( truck standing on an incline was ac- ‘ cidentally set in motion. Two or ! three bystanders, one after the other,' ' jumped on it and tried to put down.:/, the breaks. The breaks, as usual, were out of order and would not work, and .T the men only succeeded in jumping off again when the truck was travelling at about twenty miles an hour. The incline was a long one, and at a considerable distance was a bridge out of repair, on and under which a gang of navvies were working. If the run-o/ away reached the bridge, it would inevitably break through the enfeebled timbers upon the heads of the men beneath. An engine-driver named Frank . ' Lee, who was sitting upon his,,.» engine, with a car full of' Chinamen behind it, saw the start,, j and immediately gave chase. As the truck kept rattling quicker and quicker down the line, he had to put. on all steam before he overtook it; when the bridge was already, in sight,': Giving charge of the engine to his stoker, he climbed out on the cowcatcher, and stood on the end of it \ with the engine going at sixty miles an ' hour, holding the heavy coupling-bar ‘ in his hand. The truck was overhauled, and in that perilous position he stepped forward, made the coupling, '■ and ordered the engine to be reversed. The pair were stopped within a few yards of the bridge through which they f would all have gone together in three J seconds. Bravo, Frank Lee! It is not mentioned how the Chinamen liked their ride.