juries of which he died the next day. Mr. Gannon had been to the upper end of the yard and got a broken target, which he was taking to the shop to be repaired. As he passed down the track he was observed by an engineer to be intently studying a tag upon the target, which contained instructions as to repairing it. A few seconds later he was struck by the tender of a locomotive that was backing down from the turn-table, forced forward upon his face, run over and crushed. The locomotive carried but forty pounds of steam and was moving less than four miles an hour. Its engineer and fireman were both at its windows looking out for obstructions upon the track, but Mr. Gannon walked so close to the tender that their line of vision did not include him, and they were first made aware that any one was in danger by the shouts of a switchman after the accident occurred. The engine bell was ringing at the time, but Mr. Gannon was slightly deaf, and if he had not been it would probably not have attracted his attention, as there were several other engines moving near by. From a remark he made after he was injured, it would seem that he thought he was walking upon the main track, which he knew was the only safe one at that hour of the day. We find no evidence that any one was as fault, the accident being clearly due to the victim becoming so engrossed with the tag upon the target that he unconsciously stepped upon the side track and into a position where the greatest vigilance on the part of others could not have saved him. By the Board, E. B. S. SANBORN, Clerk. XVI. ACCIDENT AT SUNCOOK. STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE. IN BOARD OF RAILROAD COMMISSIONERS, CONCORD, February 14, 1887. As the morning passenger train north was crossing the bridge between Suncook station and the China Mills, February 3, the engine struck and killed G. Petit, an employe in the mills, who was going from the yard to the freight-house across the river upon an errand. The engine had just passed the three crossings below the bridge, at which the whistle had been sounded, and when Petit was discovered upon the track some thirty feet ahead of the engine, the engineer reversed his engine, put on the brakes and blew the whistle, while the fireman rang the bell. But as Petit was quite deaf, the warning did not arrest his attention, and, although the train was stopped before going its length after he was first seen by the fireman, he was struck and instantly killed. This bridge is near a sharp curve in the road, and a coal-shed built close to the track by the China Mills so obstructs the view that an engineer cannot see the track upon the bridge until within about twenty feet of it, when going north. It is a deck bridge, high above the water, with no railing to prevent a person from falling over its sides. It would be a perilous footpath if no train ever ran over it, and a person who walks across it when a train is approaching, without exercising the greatest care, invites destruction. Yet the engine men testified at the investigation in this case that they have to whistle people from it nearly every trip, and there is other evidence showing that because it is the shortest cut from the China Mills to the village about the station, it is in almost constant use as a highway. That only one of the hundreds of trespassers upon it has recently been run over and killed cannot easily be explained, and furnishes no reason for supposing that they will be equally fortunate in future. In the case before us the trainmen did all they could to prevent the accident, and it was clearly due to the carelessness of the man who was killed. By the Board, E. B. S. SANBORN, Clerk. XVII. ACCIDENT AT CLAREMONT. STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE. IN BOARD OF RAILROAD COMMISSIONERS, CONCORD, February 22, 1887. On the evening of January 8, Henry A. Bond, of Claremont, about twenty years of age, jumped from the passenger train while crossing the Windsor bridge of the Sullivan County Railroad, fell from the bridge to the ice below, about fifty feet, and was instantly killed. Bond and a companion named Fritz were at the Claremont Junction station on the evening of January 8, and as passenger train No. 23 approached the station Bond proposed to Fritz that they should get upon the rear platform of the train and ride to Windsor, and catch a ride back on a freight train that was due to leave soon after the arrival of train No. 23 at Windsor. They boarded the train as proposed by Bond, and were not discovered by the conductor, the night being quite dark. W. M. Mansfield, a brakeman, went to arrange the lanterns on the rear platform as they were approaching the bridge, and discovered them. Bond was standing on the steps and Fritz on the platform. The brakeman invited them to come inside the car, and did not wait to see if they did so, but passed back to the front of the train and told the conductor there were two passengers in the rear car. The conductor went to look after them, and found Fritz still standing on the platform, and was informed by Fritz that Bond appeared frightened at being discovered by the brakeman, and had jumped from the train and had fallen or was thrown over the side of the bridge. Search was made for him at once, and his remains were found on the ice below the bridge where he had fallen. By the Board, E. B. S. SANBORN, Clerk. XVIII. ACCIDENT AT CONCORD. STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE. IN BOARD OF RAILROAD COMMISSIONERS, CONCORD, February 21, 1887. As the passenger train over the White Mountain division of the Boston & Lowell Railroad, which left Concord at 9.40 on the evening of February 15, was approaching a culvert about four hundred and seventy feet north of the point where the highway leading from Concord to East Concord crosses the track, the engineer discovered a sleigh standing squarely upon the track about thirty feet in front. He stopped his train as soon as possible, but not until it had struck the sleigh and hurled it, its contents, and the horse harnessed to it across the culvert, which was twenty feet wide, and carried them some distance beyond. The sleigh was smashed into fragments, the horse fatally hurt, and the mangled remains of a man were found under the smoking-car hung to the brake-rod by a stout stocking. This man was Charles F. Hill, a citizen of Sanbornton, who about an hour before left a stable in Concord to drive to East Concord, where he purposed to spend the night. He was so intoxicated when he started that the by-standers were obliged to help him into the sleigh, and he undoubtedly soon fell asleep and left the horse to go without guidance, as was his habit when in that condition. The imprints of the sleigh-runners and horse's feet in the snow showed plainly that the horse, upon reaching the crossing, left the highway and walked up the track, proceeding until he came to the culvert, where he stopped and stood still until the train overtook him. As neither the engineer nor fireman could see any man in the sleigh when they first discovered it, it is probable that Hill had slipped from the seat and lay asleep in the bottom when he was struck and killed. There is no charge of neglect of duty on the part of any railroad employe. The regulation whistle was sounded before the train, which was not running more than twelve miles an hour, reached the crossing. The man in charge of the crossing was at his post with a lantern when the train went by, and the engineer and fireman did their utmost to stop the engine as soon as the obstruction upon the track was discovered. That they did not see it sooner was due to a curve in the track, which threw the head-light to one side until it was near the culvert, but if it had been upon a straight line the result would have been equally fatal. The accident simply adds another to the victims of intemperance. By the Board, E. B. S. SANBORN, Clerk. XIX. ACCIDENT AT TILTON. STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE, IN BOARD OF RAILROAD COMMISSIONERS. CONCORD, February 21, 1887. On the morning of February 8, the trackmen upon the Tilton section of the White Mountain division of the Boston & Lowell Rail road, upon going to work, found upon the track the dismembered and frozen body of a man. It proved to be the remains of Joseph McCunnin, of Montreal, who left a situation in Boston to go to his home the day before. Nothing can be learned of him from the time he left Boston until his body was found, as neither the trainmen nor any of the passengers, so far as we can discover, recollect seeing him. It is supposed that he was a passenger upon the Central Vermont section of the train that left Concord at 9 o'clock P. M., February 7, and, in attempting to pass from one car to another, fell between the platforms, was run over and killed. His body was evidently dragged some distance by the cars of the train from which he fell, and was afterwards struck and carried still farther up the track by the engine of a later train, upon which pieces of his clothing were found when it reached Woodsville. But in the darkness of the night he was seen by no one, and there is no direct evidence as to how his death occurred. By the Board, E. B. S. SANBORN, Clerk. XX. ACCIDENT AT TILTON. STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE. IN BOARD OF RAILROAD COMMISSIONERS, CONCORD, February 7, 1887. Freight train No. 2, moving south from Tilton station on the White Mountain division of the Boston & Lowell Railroad, February 7, 1887, at 9.15 o'clock A. M., struck and instantly killed Chellis Sargent, an aged resident of Tilton. Mr. Sargent was using the railroad for a highway, traveling upon the side track towards the passenger station and towards the approaching train, and when nearly opposite the latter he stepped from the siding to the main track directly in front of the locomotive. It is conjectured that he mistook the track upon which the train was moving to meet him and sought to avoid it by changing to the main line, or that, absorbed in his own thoughts, he did not notice it. Had the train been moving behind him instead of in front of him, his deafness would furnish a satisfactory reason for his |