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Author: mahorn1955
Surnames: Schoch, Ehret,
Classification: death
Message Board URL:
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Message Board Post:
Bluffton Chronicle
November 6, 1905
GEORGE SCHOCH KILLED BY C. B. & C. ENGINE
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Former Bluffton Man is First Victim To Meet Death On The New Road.
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Wreck Occurred Saturday Night
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Engine of Gravel Train Overturned into the Ditch and Schoch Was Scalded to Death
__
George Schoch, of Pennville, formerly a resident of this city, was the victim of the first
fatal accident which has occurred on the C.B.C. railroad. He was fatally injured in a bad
wreck which occurred Saturday evening at 5:40 o'clock at a point eight miles south of
Bluffton, on the Reuben Stout farm, situated between Petroleum and Reiffsburg. Schoch, who
was the fireman on the wrecked engine, died shortly after one o'clock Sunday morning.
Engineer F.F. Thompson also of Pennville escaped with only slight injuries.
The wrecked train consisted of only the engine and tender, and a passenger coach. In the
coach were Conductor Jennings and a brakeman and the entire crew were returning to
Pennville after having brought a gravel train of nineteen cars to this city
The train was running southward at a pretty high rate of speed, about twenty five miles
and hour, Jennings said, the crew intended to meet the regular north bound passenger train
at Fiatt. The engine was running backward, there being no way of turning the engines
around, and the tender was the first to leave the rails. It jumped off onto the east side
of the track in such a way that the engine striking it was overturned in the opposite
direction, onto the west side of the track. The passenger coach did not leave the rails.
Thompson managed to extricate himself from the overturned engine before he was burned by
escaping steam, but Schoch was scalded from head o foot and the flesh peeled off in
places. The skin peeled off his hands like a pair of gloves. He was not pinned down by the
engine, as was first reported, and got out of the wreckage by himself, but he was directly
in the was of the clouds of escaping steam and a few seconds were sufficient for his flesh
to be literally cooked.
After getting clear of the wreck Schoch and Thompson were both able to walk to the pike
about a half mile to the east, where a rig was provided to taken hem to Petroleum. Doctors
H. W. Markley and F.M. Dickson did all that medical skill could do to alleviate the
sufferings of the injured while Dr. L.A. Spaulding, of this city, the road surgeon, was
called by telephone, ad drove to Petroleum.
The injured men were taken to Pennville to their homes on the passenger train, which had
been held up at Petroleum. Schoch realized his critical condition and said that if he must
die he wanted to die at home with his family around him. Dr. Spaulding went to Pennville
and did all that was possible for Schoch until death relieved his sufferings.
Engineer Thompson had one ankle sprained but received no burns, and none of his injuries
were of a serious nature. Realizing that Schoch was much worse hurt that himself Thompson
refused to let the doctors care for him at Petroleum until all possible attention had been
given to Schoch.
Schock was aged about thirty seven and he leaves a wife and five young children to mourn
his death. He was a son of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Schoch and was born near Tocain, this
county. His father ahs been dead a number of years but his mother is still living near
Tocsin. He also has a brother living in Ohio, and a sister, Mrs. Will Yarger, at Tocsin.
Schoch was married in 1885 to Miss Viona Ehret a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. William Ehrett,
then residing at Ossian. Both of her parents died last spring. She has two brothers George
and A. S. Ehrett, living at Ossian, and they drove through this city to Pennville Sunday.
Schoch has been in the employ of the C.B. &C. more than two years and he moved with
his family to Pennville during the past summer. He formerly lived in Oklahoma suburb of
this city, where he owned property, and he was employed for quite a long time as section
foreman on the L. N. & W. He also worked at one time at the Grimes shops and the
Arnold Elevator.
The funeral of Schoch was held Tuesday at Ossian. The funeral party left Pennville early
in the morning to drive to Ossian and arrived there about two o'clock in the
afternoon.
The American Mechanics lodge of this city, of which Schoch was a member, met at their hall
at eleven o'clock on Tuesday forenoon, and marched to the south end of Main Street to
meet the funeral party and act as an escort through the city. W.A. McFarren and C.S.
Wiltse, of the Mechanics lodge, drove to Pennville Sunday afternoon to assist in making
arrangement for the funeral. The funeral benefits of the order have already been paid to
the family.
The C.B. & C. had a wrecking crew at work all day Sunday, but having no wreck train or
tools to meet the emergency could accomplish little. The engine lay on its side so that
the pony trucks, or small wheels, were partly on the track. There was no way of moving the
engine and the workmen built a track around it on the east side so that other trains might
pass. The first train to get through was the passenger which pulled into Bluffton at 4:30
Sunday Afternoon.
Cause of The Wreck
A C.B. & C. employee, who worked at the scene of the wreck all day Sunday, says that
no defect was found in the track at the place where the wreck occurred; in fact, he says
it seemed as good a piece of track as any point on the road. The flange was broken on one
of the wheels of the tender but whether it was broken before or in the wreck itself could
not be determined. There were no marks on the rails, he says, to indicate that it was
broken off before the wreck.
When the tender jumped off to the east side of the track it was pushed along for about
fifty feet in the soft dirt until it struck a solid bank, where it was reared into the air
and catching the engine, toppled it over in the opposite direction.
Thompson jumped through a cab window as the engine went over, but Schock was caught in the
cab. A big three inch pipe leading to the lubricators and injectors broke off and the
whistle also broke off and was blown seventy five feet. Escaping steam and water from the
pipes were what cooked Schock alive.
It developed Monday that instead of trying to reach Petroleum the crew was trying to reach
Fiatt to meet the passenger and were therefore probably running at a faster speed than
usual.
Nothing has yet been done toward raising the engine and it will be necessary to get heavy
jacks and blocks and tackle from Fort Wayne to raise it. Both it and the tender are badly
demolished and it may be impossible to repair them. Even their temporary loss is a heavy
blow to the C.B. & C. The train load of nineteen cares of grave was the last that was
intended to bring to Bluffton this fall for use in the street paving and other work here.
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