1944 — Dec 31, Fog, Southern Pacific mail-express hits passenger train, near Bagley, UT-48

lornajarrettblanchard December 31, 1944

–~50 Deseret News (Dethman), UT. “Great Salt Lake wreck stole headlines in 1944.” 1-1-2005.

— 49 Salt Lake Tribune, UT. “Ogden Rail Wreck Kills 49.” 1-1-1945, p. 1.[1]

— 48 Chester Times, Chester, PA. “Wreck That Killed 48 is Cleared,” 1-2-1945, p. 1.

— 48 Ogden Standard-Examiner, UT. “Pacific Limited Crash Claims 48 Lives,” 1-1-1945, p. 1.

Narrative Information

Roberts: “In the early morning of December 31, 1944, a fast-moving express and mail train crashed into the rear of a passenger train, the Pacific Limited from Ogden, at Bagley, 17 miles west of Ogden on the Lucin Cutoff track.[2] The crash killed 48 people and injured 79. Local sheriff’s officers, National Guard troops, and medical personnel came to the Union Station to meet the rescue trains. The first casualties arrived at 10:45 a.m. Some 15 to 30 ambulances lined the track to receive the dead and injured. This was the worst accident in which the Ogden depot played a part.” (Roberts, Richard C. “How Trains Helped Win a War.” Utah History to Go. ©2016.)

Newspapers

Jan 1, Ogden Standard Examiner: “Some 50 persons died and 80 others were injured in the Sunday crash of a speeding southern Pacific mail-express and a slowly-moving passenger train — both westbound — on a fog-shrouded causeway near Bagley, in shallow waters of Great Salt Lake, 17 miles west of Ogden. The locomotive of the second section bored into the rear Pullman of the passenger unit…. Force of the impact sent another sleeping car smashing through the dining car and farther ahead slammed one coach into the wooden coach ahead of it. Cars of the express section piled up crossways of the track behind the engine, some of them sliding down the causeway embankment into water.

“Most of the dead were taken from the rear Pullman car and from the telescoped coach. At least 28 were military service men. The train had left Chicago at ten a.m. Friday, bound for San Francisco.

“Pacific Limited Crash Claims 48 Lives

“Weary railroad officials and army and navy authorities today continued to add to the still incomplete list of casualties in the tragic wreck of the Pacific Limited early yesterday, as grim rescue squads hacked and burned their way through the twisted scrap to find possible new victims.” (Ogden Standard-Examiner. “Pacific Limited Crash Claims 48 Lives,” Jan 1, 1945.)

Jan 1, SLT: “Ogden, Dec 31 — Forty-nine persons, mostly soldiers and sailors, were killed and 81 were badly injured when a mail and express train rammed into the rear of the Southern Pacific railroad’s Pacific Limited (No. 21) 18 miles west of Ogden shortly after 6 a.m. (MWT) Sunday.

“Known dead of army and navy personnel was unofficially set at 35, with all three rescue trains reporting back to Ogden. Thirteen civilian dead had been identified early Monday. Investigators believed there may still be one or more bodies in the wreckage which relief crews have been unable to reach.

“Among the identified dead were James McDonald, Ogden, engineer of the mail and express train; W. S. Duerdon, brakeman on the passenger section, and three dining car employes, all of Oakland, Cal….One of the cruelest tragedies of the wreck was the killing of four members of one family, and two of their in-laws. They were Mr. and Mrs. Leroy Porter of Sparks, Nev., and their daughters, Peggy, 14, and Mary, 8. The in-laws were Mr. and Mrs. Jack Francis of Carlin, Nev., brother and sister-in-law of Mrs. Porter….

“Thirty-nine of the injured were taken on west to Elko, Nev., in two army hospital cars which were near the front end in the Pacific Limited….

“The rear end crash occurred apparently in a dense fog arising from the Great Salt Lake marshes, a few hundred yards beyond Bagley, a railroad siding. The railroad line is double-tracked, equipped with block signals and straight at that point.

“Passengers aboard the Pacific Limited reported that the train was traveling slowly (about 15 miles per hour) when the express ploughed into the rear, crushing wooden cars in some sections of the train and leaving others almost intact….

“The worst carnage was in the last car, a Pullman sleeper, the diner (four cars from the rear), and a coach, the eighth or ninth from the locomotive. One coach was driven into a wooden coach ahead like a piston, compressing it into about one-fifth its normal length. This telescoped cr was a tangled mass of dead, dying, moaning injured and debris. The passenger train cars remained in a line, most of them on the track. The damage, it appeared, was due almot entirely to the weaker cars collapsing. The lead cars of the express and mail train were strewn around in the general shape of a six-pointed star.

“The site of the wreck is on a high grade, several miles before the trestle across Great Salt Lake starts. For miles on both sides is boggy, gray muck, making it impossible to reach the disaster scene with motor vehicles. This severely handicapped rescue work….

“There were 18 cars in all, and about 10 were in usable condition….” (Salt Lake Tribune, UT/ O. N. Malmquist). “Ogden Rail Wreck Kills 49.” 1-1-1945, p. 1.)

2005, Deseret News: “Scores of soldiers eagerly awaited a happy homecoming after serving in World War II…. But such a homecoming was not their fate. It was 60 years ago that a train wreck in Ogden killed some 50 people, including at least 35 army and navy personnel….

“The Pacific Limited[3] was on its way from Ogden to California. Thick fog filled the air as the first whistle sounded about 3 a.m. The train usually traveled in one long section, but on this day the train was split in two sections, the passenger car and the mail express train.

“Somehow in the midst of the fog hovering above the Great Salt Lake, the driver of the second engine plowed into the back of the passenger train at Bagley, 17 miles west of Ogden on the Lucin cutoff track. The passenger train was moving at 18 mph, while the freight train was chugging along much faster.

“Several train cars plummeted into the cold Great Salt Lake. In total, 81 other people were injured in the tangled mass of wreckage strewn for more than a half mile along the tracks….” (Deseret News (Leigh Dethman), Salt Lake City, UT. “Great Salt Lake wreck stole headlines in 1944. Train crash claimed 50 lives on New Year’s Eve.” 1-1-2005.)

Jan 2, UP: “Ogden, Utah. (UP) – Traffic was resumed over the Southern Pacific Railroad today as officials tentatively scheduled an investigation, Thursday, into the wreck of the Pacific Limited in which 48 persons were killed and 79 others were injured early Sunday in a rear end collision 22 miles west of here.” (Chester Times.(PA). “Wreck That Killed 48 is Cleared,” January 2, 1945, p. 1.)

Sources

Chester Times, PA. “Wreck That Killed 48 is Cleared,” January 2, 1945, p. 1. Accessed at: http://www.newspaperarchive.com/FullPagePdfViewer.aspx?img=95224036

Deseret News (Leigh Dethman), Salt Lake City, UT. “Great Salt Lake wreck stole headlines in 1944. Train crash claimed 50 lives on New Year’s Eve.” 1-1-2005. Accessed 12-16-2016 at: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/600101823/Great-Salt-Lake-wreck-stole-headlines-in-1944.html

Ogden Standard-Examiner, Ogden, UT. “One of West’s Worst Rail Accidents.” 1-1-1945. Accessed 12-16-2016 at Genealogybuff.com: http://www.genealogybuff.com/misc/ut-bagley-trainwreck.htm

Ogden Standard-Examiner, Ogden UT. “Pacific Limited Crash Claims 48 Lives.” 1-1-1945, p. 1. Accessed 12-16-2016 at: http://newspaperarchive.com/us/utah/ogden/ogden-standard-examiner/1945/01-01?tag

Salt Lake Tribune, UT. “Ogden Rail Wreck Kills 49.” 1-1-1945, p. 1. Accessed 12-16-2016 at: http://newspaperarchive.com/us/utah/salt-lake-city/salt-lake-tribune/1945/01-01?tag=bagley

[1] In the article text 35 military and 13 civilian deaths are noted, which comes to 48, while noting that “Investigators believed there may still be one or more bodies in the wreckage which relief crews have been unable to reach.”

[2] The Salt Lake Tribune of Jan 1, 1945 includes a drawing of the area showing Bagley as near and just to the east of Promitory Point.

[3] Of the Southern Pacific line.