AN ENGINEER ROASTED ALIVE.

Mataura Ensign, Volume V, Issue 234, 2 March 1883, Page 6

AN ENGINEER ROASTED ALIVE.

A hideous accident occurred upon the Lehigh Valley Eailroad at Bummerfield, New York, a small station between Tonawanda and Wyalusing. The horror consisted not so much in the loaa of life as in the manner in which the lives were lost. Train No. 8, due at Elmira at 5.25, owing to a misplaced switch, ran into a freight train standing on the south bound track at Reemerfield, and the engines crashing into each other were reduced to ruins. The baggage and express cars were thrown from 15 to 20 feet from the track. The wreck was complete. The baggageman and expressmen were thrown on the top of the cars, receiving serious, but not fatal injuries. The first sleeping car was thrown up on the tender of the passenger engine, and three freight care laden with hay were piled up promiscuously on the wreck, and the debris at once took fire. Then ensued a most heart-rending scene. The engineer, N. Faulke, of Waverly, stood in the midst of the burning mass in plain view of the spectators, but could not move as his right leg was caught in the iron and timbers as if in a vice. All his efforts to release himself from the fire roaring around him were in vain. He could only stand there and look death in the face. It came slowly, surely, and cruelly. The crowd did what they could to save him but the heat was too intense. The man was gradually roasted before his friends and companions who were unable to give him any succour. There was no flinching about the unhappy man, however. He stood up and calmly directed the efforts of the men who were trying to save him, even while the scalding steam was stripping the flesh from his bones he shouted to the bystandsrs to cut the cab away, but this could not be done on account of the fearful heat from the burning hay. Flames from this ignited the express baggage car, and next the sleeper that had been piled on top of the engine, so that Faulke was speedily beyond all human aid. The spectators could only turn their heads away from the horrid sight. The fireman of the freight train Leander Kingsman of Waverly was missed from the first. The body was subsequently found under the charred timbers of the trains. Both men have wives and children. No passengers fortunately were injured. The accident is the most serious that has happened on the Lehigh Kailway, in many years, and blocked the road nearly all day. The unrecognisable remains of the engineer and fireman have been taken to their homes 9\ Waverly,