Central Pacific 1866 (Letter)
From: "Sue Agnew" sue.agnew@gmail.com
I am researching a man who traveled the Central Pacific from Sacramento to its terminus around October 18-22, 1866. Do I assume correctly that the end of the line at that time was at Alta? His destination was Sierraville. Would he have taken a stage the remainder of the trip?
In a letter to family back in Michigan, this man wrote that "The train on the Central Pacific R.R. proceeding to climb the Sierra Nevada mountains ran off the track on a sheer precipice, but the coaches and passengers did not follow the engine 90 feet down the abyss." I am skeptical about this account, since it seems to me that if the engine went down into the abyss then the other cars would have followed. Certainly they wouldn't have come loose very easily. Am I correct about my assumption or would the cars have remained on the track?
Also, if what he says is accurate, then there would have to be another engine brought in to take the cars along their way. I would also assume this would have been newsworthy, but I cannot find any account of such an incident reported in the area newspapers of that time.
I would appreciate knowing your assessment of this man's account, since your organization would be much more familiar with the CPRR of that era than I. If you feel it is possibly a true account, do you have any suggestions as to sources that I could use to document this incident? ...
—Sue Agnew, Tahlequah, Oklahoma
"During the trip up the Sacramento river the Crysopolis narrowly escaped collision with a returning craft. The train on the Central Pacific R.R. proceeding to climb the Sierra Nevada mountains ran off the track on a sheer precipice, but the coaches and passengers did not follow the engine 90 feet down the abyss."
I am researching a man who traveled the Central Pacific from Sacramento to its terminus around October 18-22, 1866. Do I assume correctly that the end of the line at that time was at Alta? His destination was Sierraville. Would he have taken a stage the remainder of the trip?
In a letter to family back in Michigan, this man wrote that "The train on the Central Pacific R.R. proceeding to climb the Sierra Nevada mountains ran off the track on a sheer precipice, but the coaches and passengers did not follow the engine 90 feet down the abyss." I am skeptical about this account, since it seems to me that if the engine went down into the abyss then the other cars would have followed. Certainly they wouldn't have come loose very easily. Am I correct about my assumption or would the cars have remained on the track?
Also, if what he says is accurate, then there would have to be another engine brought in to take the cars along their way. I would also assume this would have been newsworthy, but I cannot find any account of such an incident reported in the area newspapers of that time.
I would appreciate knowing your assessment of this man's account, since your organization would be much more familiar with the CPRR of that era than I. If you feel it is possibly a true account, do you have any suggestions as to sources that I could use to document this incident? ...
—Sue Agnew, Tahlequah, Oklahoma
"During the trip up the Sacramento river the Crysopolis narrowly escaped collision with a returning craft. The train on the Central Pacific R.R. proceeding to climb the Sierra Nevada mountains ran off the track on a sheer precipice, but the coaches and passengers did not follow the engine 90 feet down the abyss."
posted from CPRR Discussion Group at 12:40 AM
2 Comments:
Sue Agnew,
Would it be possible for you to tell us the name of the man writing this letter, any biographical information you have about him, and to provide a legible scan of the letter that you are asking about?
Thanks!
From: "Sue Agnew" sue.agnew@gmail.com
Thank you for your response to my inquiry. The man I am researching is John Gill Lemmon, born June 2, 1832, in Lima, Michigan, and died November 25, 1908, in Oakland, California. Lemmon moved to join family in California in 1866, following the end of his imprisonment at Florence and Andersonville prison camps during the Civil War. He was a self-taught botanist and became well know in his field in California. His wife, Sarah Plummer Lemmon, was also a botanist and was responsible for the selection of the California Poppy as the state flower.
Thank you for the link to the CPRR construction schedule. After having done a little more research, I'm thinking perhaps Lemmon got off at Dutch Flat and took the stage to Sierra City from there, rather than going on to Alta, since Dutch Flat seems to have been a major stagecoach center at that time.
I am attaching a ... copy of Lemmon's letter to his brother Charley [see above] in which he describes the train incident I mentioned in my email. (The passage is located near the bottom of the first column.) The article was pasted into his personal collection of newspaper articles, and was most likely sent to an Ann Arbor newspaper near his hometown. The online copies of that paper are missing the dates when the letter was published, so I can't verify its date. His brother still lived near the homeplace at the time the letter was written. I can only assume that Lemmon sent his brother the letter, and a copy to the area newspaper. ...
—Sue Agnew, Tahlequah, Oklahoma
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