(The following appeared on the Brooklyn Eagle website on February 6.)
WOODBRIDGE, NJ — Pennsylvania Railway’s Number 733, the “Broker,” was the deluxe commuter train running from Newark to Red Bank and making stops at the upper-middle-class havens along the New Jersey shore, where many of its business executive passengers resided. Number 733 also had the further distinction of being one of the last important trains in the United States to maintain a steam locomotive. This image of quality and charm in railroading came to a gruesome end on the evening of Feb. 6, 1951.
At that time a new railway bridge over the New Jersey Turnpike was being built. While its construction was under way, the “Broker” was to use a bypass that involved a lazy S-curve — a five-degree turn as it swung right, a short tangent of track and then a sharp curve to the left. Engineer Joseph H. Fitzsimmons, a 47-year-old Pennsylvania employee with a long and commendable record with the line, received the following general order on Feb. 6, 1951:
“PERTH AMBOY AND WOODBRIDGE BRANCH — WOODBRIDGE-GENASCO. Number 2 main track and catenary moved 50 feet northward between a point 1,000 feet west of Woodbridge Station and a point 4,000 feet west of Woodbridge Station. Trains and engines must not exceed a speed of 25 miles per hour between these points.”
Conductor “Honest John” Bishop and Fitzsimmons talked about the “slow” order before the train’s departure from Jersey City, a conversation Bishop was to recall later at an inquiry. (The conductor wasn’t called “Honest John” for nothing; he had once returned to a passenger, a satchel containing $25,000, which he found in Grand Central Station.)
Though the old steam engine Fitzsimmons was piloting had no speed indicater, the engineer, for all his years of service, would certainly have known whether he was traveling much above the restricted 25 mph limit. The fact was that Fitzsimmons was fairly racing his train onto the perilous bypass (the railroad had also demanded that the “Broker” make its 35-mile run in a forty-four minute schedule).
Conductor Bishop realized the train was moving onto the bypass at excessive speed and tried to push his way through a crowded car to get to the emergency signal cord, but he was too late. Number 733 swung sharply onto the first five-degree turn, roared down the straight track, and then, at speeds later estimated to be between 50 and 60 mph, attempted to make the second curve. The speed was too much.
With a screech of grinding metal, the locomotive left the tracks, sailed over an embankment and landed on its side with a loud crash. Fitzsimmons was thrown cleanly with only minor scratches. His fireman, A.M. Dunn, was fatally injured.
Following the engine, the next seven cars left the track and flopped onto their sides. Though these cars were of all-steel construction, they were severely damaged. Bedlam broke out in these cars, as according to one eyewitness, terrified passengers went berserk in their efforts to get out, punching and kicking eachother.
“They were like a bunch of wild animals trying to get out of overturned cages, clawing each other to get clear.” The chaos was the second nightmare of the crash; the inside of the first four coaches looked to arriving rescuers as if they had been blown apart by grenades. Bodies were everywhere, jammed beneath seats, and in luggage racks. Pieces of bodies and blotches of blood smeared the walls and remaining windows.
Dozens were so crazed by the crash that they mistook Fulton Street, glistening beneath street lights, for a river, and as they stumbled from the wreck they dove from the embankment onto the concrete, further injuring themselves.
The accident, which claimed the lives of 83 passengers and that of fireman Dunn (who lived for only three hours and could therefore not testify against his engineer), was clearly the responsibility of Joseph Fitzsimmons. He was interrogated by Benjamin Van Tine, New Jersey’s deputy attorney general, but he insisted that he was not going more than 25 mph, as per the general order he had received that morning, when the “Broker” entered the bypass.
Conductor Bishop and scores of passengers refuted his statements, and a board of inquiry later determined his speed at a little more than 50 mph Fitzsimmons then stated that he was looking through a thin fog for a warning light even though he knew that the general order obviated the use of any such light. Finally, Fitzsimmons, near collapse, admitted he could have been going 50 mph His testimony then trailed off into a dull, witless monotone as he repeated: “I kept looking for a yellow light, a yellow light, a yellow light …”