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1977-1981
  
Public Relations and Advertising Department
Windsor Station Montreal Que. H3C 3E4
 

Volume 7   Number 12

Sept. 21, 1977


Ghostly Overture for a Tragedy

By Nicholas Morant


 
This was a pleasant evening in June 1908. Engineman Bob Twohey and Fireman Gus Day were taking their light engine up the Dunmore Hill from the Medicine Hat roundhouse to relieve the engine and crew off the westbound Spokane Flyer.
 
The connecting rods clanked quietly and the measured, almost contented sounds of the locomotive's exhaust alone disturbed the silence of the Alberta countryside. It was just before eleven o'clock.
 
As they approached one of several blind curves along the track, which follows the side of a three mile coulee, Twohey was startled by the sound of the whistle of another train. Then he was blinded by the sight of a glaring headlight of an approaching train and, in the full knowledge that he was operating on single track, he reached for his controls but it was a hopeless gesture.
 
Turning Red
 
With a roar the train was upon him and he was aware of the smoke over the cab of the engine turning red as its fireman opened the firebox door - a familiar enough sight in days of steam.
 
Despite the fact he was on a single track, the next thing he recalled was that the nightmarish train was now passing him. Both men were to confide later with close friends that the passing "Phantom Train" had lights in the coaches, silhouetting the passengers inside them.
 
More than that, the front end trainman and his conductor were in the vestibule to wave a friendly highball which, moments later was repeated by the tail end man.
 
As quickly as it takes to relate this, the Phantom Train had vanished. The experience left both men's brows glistening with sweat from the sheer terror of it. They continued their run, took over the Flyer on schedule and it was not until several days later, when the two men met off duty on the street in Medicine Hat, that they came to realize they both shared this frightening secret. With the exception of closest friends or relatives they agreed not to share it with anyone. For who would have believed them?
 
This was the era when Canadian Pacific Railway operated the Spokane Flyer, which ran northwards to Yahk, B.C., through Cranbrook and the Crowsnest Pass to Lethbridge. Swinging north it bypassed Medicine Hat and joined the main line at Dunmore Junction to continue on to Moose Jaw, southwards into the United States and terminating in Chicago. Since the train did not go into Medicine Hat it was necessary to run relief engines and crews seven miles up the Dunmore Coulee to the junction. It must be recalled that in those days, crews as well as engines generally changed off at divisional points.
 
Following the chance meeting with Gus Day on the street, Twohey became more and more alarmed and distraught over the incident. It preyed on his mind to such an extent that he visited a fortune teller. He received little encouragement. He was told he had less than a month to live. Then he made an attempt to strike back at Fate. He booked off work for awhile.
 
Shortly afterwards, Fireman Day found himself assigned to the same locomotive on which he had travelled with Twohey when they encountered the Phantom Train. However, this time, the engine man was James Nicholson.
 
Approaching the same bend in the track they both heard the moan of a locomotive whistle. This was Day's second time but now Nicholson, who knew nothing whatever about the matter, was treated to the horrifying first sight of the approaching glare of a headlight. Once again, the train passed them by, the forms of the passengers visible in their coaches and, again, the ghostly highballs from the train crew. In seconds the apparition was gone leaving those in the light engine speechless.
 
Three men, one of them on two different occasions, had now witnessed this phenomenon and each time from the same locomotive. Was it some form of mass hallucination?
 
It is unlikely there will ever be an explanation - but retired engineer Andy Staysko, alive and well at age 86 and still holding his driver's licence in Lethbridge, knew Gus Day very well and shared and intimacy with him which extended for many years after the event.
 
On the morning of July 8, Gus Day related to Staysko, he went to work at Medicine Hat and found himself assigned to yard duties. His place on the light engine to relieve the westwards Spokane Flyer that morning was Harry Thompson. The engineer was James Nicholson. Inexorably now, Fate was taking over and the Spectre of Death stood waiting at Privett's Brickyard crossing one mile away.
 
In full daylight, the light engine was approaching the area of the Phantom Train. Not on a corner, however, but on a fairly long tangent ( straightaway ) James Nicholson looked for the last time at an oncoming train.
 
It was not an hallucination this time. The Crowsnest Local, Number 17, was running late.
 
In the holocaust of steam and twisted metals that followed the head on collision, James Nicholson was fatally injured. Fireman Thompson was badly injured in his jump to safety. Engineer of Number 17 was Robert Twohey, who tried so hard to beat Fate. He died in the wreckage, with his fireman, in the searing inferno of live steam inside the cab of his overturned locomotive.
 
The Medicine Hat News, July 9, 1908, headlined the "AWFUL RAILWAY WRECK THIS MORNING". The next edition listed five railroaders killed along with two passengers in the telescoped, wooden coaches of the
era.
 
Clearance
 
At the inquests ( there were two ), questions were asked about the "clearance" given by Operator Ritchie. It was the opinion of the jury that "he had failed to note on his clearance form to engine 702 that train 17 had not yet arrived". The jury also blamed Nicholson as well because he "failed to check the train register and ascertain for himself whether or not his clearance was correct".
 
There is evidence that Operator Ritchie might have been physically exhausted at the time but, though he was called to the inquest he never testified.
 
He vanished without a trace following the mishap and was never found, in spite of extensive searches by the Royal North West Mounted Police.
 
Surely Fate blindfolded these men. Could three of them forget a Time Card train? Of Nicholson there was a suggestion that he had encountered family problems the morning of his departure which might have taken his mind off his work - if for only a few fatal seconds.
 
Cause of Nicholson's death, as specified legally, was shock. And who can wonder at that?

This CP Rail News article is copyright 1977 by Canadian Pacific Railway and is reprinted here with their permission. All photographs, logos, and trademarks are the property of the Canadian Pacific Railway Company.

© 2005 William C. Slim       http://www.okthepk.ca