Compiled by Wayne Blanchard; last edit 4-1-2024 for upload to: http://www.usdeadlyevents.com/

— 35 AP. “Troop Train Wreck Toll…at 35 Dead.” Washington C.H. Record-Herald, OH. 7-14-1944, p.1

— 35 Interstate Commerce Commission. Investigation No. 2812…Near High Cliff, Tenn…July 6, 1944.

— 35 Wikipedia. “List of Rail Accidents (Pre-1950).”

— 34 Coggins. Tennessee Tragedies: Natural, Technological, and Societal Disasters… 2011.

Narrative Information

Coggins: “High Cliff Train Wreck Near Jellico (Campbell County), July 6, 1944”:

A southbound Louisville-Nashville passenger train designated as ‘Troop Train Number 47’ derailed at around 9:00 pm on July 6, 1944. This incident killed thirty-four and injured at least another hundred. The wreck occurred near the mountain community of High Cliff, about three miles east of Jellico and south of the Tennessee-Kentucky state line. The exact location of the derailment was at the northern entrance to a mountain pass known as the ‘Jellico Narrows.’ After emerging from that gorge and a long straight stretch of track, the train entered a curve where the locomotive and four cars plunged into the deep gorge of clear Fork Creek, some fifty feet below. Four additional cars derailed but did not fall into the stream….”

Interstate Commerce Commission. Report…Accident Near High Cliff, Tenn…July 6, 1944:

Summary

“Railroad: Louisville & Nashville

“Date: July 6, 1944

“Location: High Cliff, Tenn.

“Kind of accident: Derailment

“Train involved: Passenger

“Train number: 47

“Engine number: 418

“Consist: 16 cars

“Estimated Speed: 45 m.p.h.

“Operation: Timetable, train orders and automatic block-signal and automatic train-

control system

“Track: Single; 11⁰15’ curve; 0.69 percent ascending grade southward

“Weather: Clear

“Time: 9:05 p.m.

“Casualties: 35 killed; 98 injured

“Cause: Combination of wide gage of track and excessive speed on sharp curve.”

[Speed was 35 mph and upward slant of track was too high.]

Report of the Commission

“On July 6, 1944, there was a derailment of a passenger train on the Louisville & Nashville Railroad near High Cliff, Tenn., which resulted in the death of 33 passengers and 2 train-service employees and the injury of 93 passengers, 3 Pullman employees and 2 train-service employees.

Wikipedia: “July 6, 1944 – Troop train crash near Jellico, Tennessee, United States: Passenger train derails due to excessive speed on defective track. 35 killed, 99 injured; all soldiers in U.S. Army en route to deployment.” (Wikipedia. “List of Rail Accidents (Pre-1950).”)

Newspapers

July 7, AP: “Jellico, Tenn. – (AP) – At least 17 persons, all but two of them soldiers, were killed last night when a troop train plunged into a 50-foot gorge of the Clear River 11 miles South of here. Dr. E. P. Muncy, resident physician of Knoxville’s General Hospital, said the death toll probably would exceed 40.

“The locomotive and four cars were piled at the ravine’s bottom, and a fifth hung over the precipitous edge, where it left the Louisville and Nashville railroad tracks.

“One soldier, identified by Army Public Relations as Pvt. Leonard Battag of Evanston, Ill., was still pinned in the bottom of a wrecked car 12 hours after the crash, with four dead men piled on him. He regained consciousness and talked with rescuers as acetylene torches cut through twisted steel nearby. The youth, in the Army only 13 days, asked a doctor if he was in a plane. ‘It sure looks like it,’ he said. ‘This is a lot better hole than on that train.’ He is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Battag of Evanston.

By noon six bodies had been brought to the government hospital at Oak Ridge, Tenn., and eight other bodies were reported on the way there. Army authorities at the hospital said that they had admitted 30 injury cases and had at least four more on the way and there were nine additional cases of soldiers given first aid treatment but not requiring hospitalization. A partial death list released by the Army included the following enlisted men, with serial numbers but with home addresses still not known:

Donald J. Clark…

Willian M. Gorey…

Dale Mattix…

H. McChesney…

“Work of extricating the victims from the locomotive and five cars which tumbled down the steep 50-foot bank to the shallow stream was slow and unofficial estimate placed the casualties as high as 25 dead and 250 hurt.

“The train was a special carrying only soldiers and the train crew.

“An emergency train made up from the twelve cars which did not leave the track left this morning taking fifty of the injured to Lake City, Tenn., enroute to the government hospital at Oak Ridge, Tenn., and at least thirty other injured service men were sent to Oak Ridge Hospital in ambulances….

“The kitchen and baggage cars of the southbound train, reported carrying more than 1,000 soldiers just out of basic training, were burned.

“Express Agent C. L. Alley of Jellico said first rescues were made by nearby mountainfolk who tediously hoisted the injured by block and tackle slings up the shrubbery-lined gorge. Waiting ambulances rushed the injured to hospitals in Lake City, LaFollette and Jellico, and Corbin and Williamsburg, Ky.

“Rescuers worked doggedly early today to free two soldiers trapped in one of the smashed coaches. Doctors gave blood plasma transfusions to one of them, pinned down in the gorge wreckage. Two others who had been trapped were extricated, one of them dead.

“The fireman, identified at a Jellico hospital as J. W. Tummins, of Etowah, died in the institution several hours after he was hurled free of the wreckage….

“A soldier, treated at Jellico Hospital, whose name was withheld, said the crash occurred ‘just after we finished dhow,’ and said he thought the fire started in the train kitchen. ‘I was in an upper berth,’ he said, ‘and was almost thrown out when we went around a curve. Just a moment later she banged off the track.’ ….

“The engineer, identified by the railroad as John C. Rollins, of Etowah, Tenn., was ‘somewhere beneath his engine,’ Yarbrough said and the fireman was picked up from the spot to which he was hurled and brought to Jellico hospital….

“In this Cumberland Mountain section on the Kentucky-Tennessee line, the L. and N. tracks traverse numerous trestles over deep gorges and loop around hairpin turns.

“Ten Army doctors and 12 Army ambulances were rushed to the scene from Clinton. They carried ample supplies of blood plasma.

“Express Agent Alley, who said the train carried 1,000 soldiers, reported early today the cars remaining upright had been switched to another track and were proceeding to their destination.”

(Associated Press. “17 Killed In Troop Train Wreck.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-7-1944, p. 1 & 8.)

July 9, AP: “Jellico, Tenn. – AP – The death toll from the plunge of a troop train into a deep gorge of nearby Clear River Thursday night mounted to at least 33 Saturday night as workmen laboriously cleared the wreckage. The Army announced that the bodies of 25 soldiers had been found and Police Chief Hubert Perkins said that six other bodies were recovered during the afternoon. The fireman and the engineer of the train also perished.

“As two giant cranes swung their cables into the rocky gorge and tugged at the last demolished car, workers said they believed at least two more bodies would be found. A spokesman for the Louisville and Nashville Railroad said it might be late Sunday before all wreckage was cleared from the 50-foot defile, where a locomotive and four cars plunged after derailment. A fifth car left the tracks but hung on the steep bank.

“While railway representatives and the Federal Bureau of Investiagation sought probable cause of the crash, 61 injured soldiers were sent by the Army to Moore General Hospital, near Asheville, N.C. Twenty others were listed as first-aid cases. Ten were left at the Oak Ridge Army Hospital, near Knoxville, because of injuries too serious to permit movement. One was in critical condition. He was identified by the Army as Austin Taunier…of Louisville, Ohio.

“The Army proceeded slowly with a list of dead and injured, and public relations officers said it might be Sunday before the compilation was announced.

“J. E. Lockhart, division engineer for the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, said no defects had been found in the tracks and added there was no evidence of sabotage….” (Associated Press. “Death Toll in Troop Train Wreck Reaches 33.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-9-1944, p.1.)

July 10, AP: “Jellico, Tenn. – AP – The list of identified dead in Thursday night’s wreck of a troop train in a gorge of nearby Clear River rose of 32 today. Police Chief Hubert Perkins said yesterday another body had been found but that it had not been identified. The names and addresses of five more of the soldier dead were announced by Army authorities as:

William R. Cathey, 1209 Hampton Ave., Paduch, Ky.;

Raymond W. Yopp, RFD 5, Paducah, Ky.;

Herbert R. Reichle, 448 Union St., Bedford, Ohio;

John R. Wisberger, 1087 Packard Drive, Akron, Ohio, and

Ray Wood, Jr., RFD 3, Kevil, Ky.

“The cause of the wreck, which killed at least 30 soldiers and two of the train’s crew, has not been determined…” (Associated Press. “32 Known Dead In Wreck of Train at Jellico.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-10-1944, p. 1.)

July 11, AP: “Jellico, Tenn. – AP – The death toll in the wreck of a troop train last Thursday in a narrow Cumberland mountain gorge reached 33 today with the discovery of a mangled body under the wreckage. ‘We are not even sure he is an Army man, although it is probable he is,’ an Army spokesman said. The body was found yesterday when a smashed coach was raised by a wrecker from the gorge. Thirty soldiers and the engineer and fireman were killed and 91 were injured in the wreck.” (Assoc. Press. “Another Body Found at Jellico.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-11-1944, 5.)

July 12, AP: “Jellico, Tenn. – AP – The death toll from a troop train wreck in Narrows Gorge near here Thursday night rose to 34 today with the Army announcement of the death of Pvt. Ray W. Parker of Trenton, O. Parker’s death in Oak Ridge Hospital was the 31^st announced fatality among Army enlisted personnel, the engineer and fireman of the Louisville and Nashville train, and one yet unidentified body completing the list.

“The & N office here said investigation of the cause of the wreck was continuing but that not conclusions had been reached. The Federal Bureau of Investigation previously said there was no evidence of sabotage.” (Associated Press. “34^th Person Dies as Result of Wreck at Jellico.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-12-1944, p. 8.)

July 13, AP: “Jellico, Tenn. – AP – Army authorities today identified the 34^th and last known casualty of a troop train wreck near here last Thursday night. The man was listed as Pvt. Donald E. Hill, RFD 5, North Canton, O. Of the casualties 32 were Army enlisted personnel, the engineer and fireman of the Louisville and Nashville train completing the list. Some 91 persons were injured.

“The L & N office here said the engine had been raised from the bottom of the gorge but that an investigation of the cause of the wreck had not been completed.” (Associated Press. “Last Casualty of Jellico Wreck Identified.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-13-1944, p. 11.)

July 14, AP: “Jellico, Tenn., July 14. – (AP) – The death of an army private in Oak Ridge Hospital brought to 35 the number of dead in a troop train wreck near here July 6. Army officers today listed the man, the 33^rd casualty among army enlisted personnel, as Austin E. Paunier, Louisville, O. He was the last man in a critical condition when hospitalized, the army spokesman said.”

(Associated Press. “Troop Train Wreck Toll Now Stands at 35 Dead.” Washington C.H. Record-Herald, Washington Court House, OH. 7-14-1944, p. 1.)

Sources

Associated Press. “17 Killed In Troop Train Wreck.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-7-1944, p. 1. Accessed 4-1-2024 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/kingsport-times-jul-07-1944-p-1/

Associated Press. “32 Known Dead In Wreck of Train at Jellico.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-10-1944, p. 1. Accessed 4-1-2024 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/kingsport-times-jul-10-1944-p-1/

Associated Press. “34^th Person Dies as Result of Wreck at Jellico.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-12-1944, p. 8. Accessed 4-1-2024 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/kingsport-times-jul-12-1944-p-8/

Associated Press. “Another Body Found at Jellico.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-11-1944, p. 5. Accessed 4-1-2024 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/kingsport-times-jul-11-1944-p-5/

Associated Press. “Death Toll in Troop Train Wreck Reaches 33.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-9-1944, p.1. Accessed 4-1-2024 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/kingsport-times-jul-09-1944-p-1/

Associated Press. “Last Casualty of Jellico Wreck Identified.” Kingsport Times, TN. 7-13-1944, p. 11. Accessed 4-1-2024 at: https://newspaperarchive.com/kingsport-times-jul-13-1944-p-11/

Coggins, Allen R. Tennessee Tragedies: Natural, Technological, and Societal Disasters in the Volunteer State. University of Tennessee Press, 2011, pp. 169-171.

Interstate Commerce Commission. Investigation No. 2812. The Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company. Report in re Accident Near High Cliff, Tenn…July 6, 1944. Washington, DC: ICC, 8-22-1944. Accessed 4-102024 at: https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/pdfjs/web/viewer.html?file=https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/45629/dot_45629_DS1.pdf

Wikipedia. “List of Rail Accidents (Pre-1950).” Accessed 3-31-2024 at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rail_accidents_(1940%E2%80%931949)#1944

1944 — July 6, troop train derails, high speed/sharp curve, into Clear River, High Cliff, TN–35