give up the machine until I was in a fainting condition with holding in
my breath, and, finally, he felled me to the floor of the cab. I
imagine that the machine rolled off the train as I fell and that he
jumped after it. The remarkable thing is that neither of us needed the
machine, for I remember that just after we started I noticed through
the open iron door that the engine fire suddenly became aglow again,
although at the time I was in too great a state of bewilderment and
horror to understand what it meant. A western gale had sprung up--an
hour too late. Even before we left Cannon Street those who still
survived were comparatively safe, for one hundred and sixty-seven
persons were rescued from that fearful heap of dead on the platforms,
although many died within a day or two after, and others never
recovered their reason. When I regained my senses after the blow dealt
by the engineer, I found myself alone, and the train speeding across
the Thames near Kew. I tried to stop the engine, but did not succeed.
However, in experimenting, I managed to turn on the air brake, which in
some degree checked the train, and lessened the impact when the crash
came at Richmond terminus. I sprang off on the platform before the
engine reached the terminal buffers, and saw passing me like a
nightmare the ghastly trainload of the dead. Most of the doors were
swinging open, and every compartment was jammed full, although, as I
afterwards learned, at each curve of the permanent way, or extra lurch
of the train, bodies had fallen out all along the line. The smash at
Richmond made no difference to the passengers. Besides myself, only two
persons were taken alive from the train, and one of these, his clothes
torn from his back in the struggle was sent to an asylum, where he was
never able to tell who he was; neither, as far as I know, did anyone
ever claim him.