New Market train wreck


Photo of wreck

Details
Date: September 24, 1904; 10:18 am
Location: Jefferson County, near New Market, Tennessee
Trains: 2
Passengers: 350
Deaths: 56 - 113
Injuries: 106

The New Market train wreck happened when two Southern Railway passenger trains traveling at great speed collided head on near New Market, Tennessee, on Saturday, September 24, 1904, killing at least 56 passengers and crew and injuring 106.

The trains concerned were the No. 15 westbound local passenger train (pulled by 4-4-0 #1838) from Bristol to Knoxville with three cars carrying 140 passengers, and the No. 12 eastbound Carolina Special (pulled by 4-6-0 #1051) from Chattanooga to Salisbury, North Carolina. The line was a single track and the normal procedure to allow the trains to pass was for the local train to stop on a side track at Hodges' Switch but when the engineer stopped at Morristown he was given special orders to stop in a siding at New Market instead. Both the conductor and engineer signed that they had read the order but later the conductor told a reporter that he had 'mis-read' it. After stopping at New Market, the train should have stopped after a few hundred yards onto the side track but it didn't.

Meanwhile, the Carolina Special had reached Strawberry Plains; it comprised nine cars: two mail cars, three wooden passenger coaches and four steel Pullman cars, many of its 210 passengers were returning from the Louisiana Purchase Exposition (St Louis World's Fair). As it drew out of the station a telegraph arrived from New Market; from horrified depot staff it read "Number 15 has run the switch and is on the main line!", but it was too late, despite waving arms and throwing stones at it, no-one aboard the Special noticed as the train gathered speed. There was one last chance to warn the trains; a telegraph was sent to Hodges' Switch, the normal passing place; but no-one was on duty and the message was never received.

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