Big Flats Train Wreck of 1889

Also known as the Great Plains Train Wreck, August 29, 1889.  Exacerbated by an order given by one W.B. Coffin, superintendant  of the Susquehanna Division of the NYLE&W Railroad.  Lehigh Valley coal train Extra 604, Conductor Higgins, passed by the Corning Station crossover point and tried to make it to Big Flats.  It collided with the Erie freight train at that station.  A flag was sent out and train 12 and behind him, train 100,  William Dickey Conductor.  Dickey sent out two flag men, A.H. Williamson at the East Corning Station and A.E. Hicks to locate his caboose.  Erie train 2, Wallace Engineer and Brock, the conductor, came from behind at a full rate of speed.  Flagman Williamson had heard the engine of train 100 whistle off brakes and assumed the tracks were clear, so he did not flag down train 2 - following special order dated July 4, 1889.

Engineer Wallace apparently did not see the second flagman, Hicks, who was approximately 1/2 mile from train 100, and ran full speed into the caboose of train 100.  The engine, baggage, express, and mail cars of train 2 and the caboose and three additional cars of train 100 were destroyed.  Engineer Wallace and Fireman Kimball were taken from the wreck in a mangled and scalded state but both were still alive.  They were both transported to their homes in Hornellsville.  Wallace was so badly injured that death relived him of his sufferings at 4 pm.