Clay County AlArchives News.....Watkins, Burcha Charged with an Attempt to Wreck a Train January 27, 1902
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Linda Ayres http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00031.html#0007674 March 29, 2023, 1:45 am

Atlanta Semi-Weekly Journal January 27, 1902
Officer John Remington, of the city police force, returned from Clay County, 
Ala., Saturday, where he had been in attendance on the circuit court of that 
county as a witness in the case of the state of Alabama against Burcha Watkins, 
a young white man, charged with an attempt to wreck a train on the Columbus and 
Western railroad. The act which was a most diabolical one was committed on 
October 16th last, and Officer Remington was at the request of the authorities 
of the Central of Georgia railway, sent to Sylacauga to work up the case, and if 
possible, arrest the perpetrator. He soon succeeded, and it was not long before 
he had Watkins in jail. The trial was held on Thursday last, and Watkins was 
sentenced to ten years in the penitentiary. It was proved at the trial that 
Watkins had placed a crosstie end upward between the ties on a trestle, the end 
of the standing tie projecting about two feet above the track. Had it not been 
for the fact that a double header freight train pulled by two heavy freight 
engines had come along and broke the projecting crosstie off, there would no 
doubt have, resulted a serious loss of life and the destruction of a whole 
train, as the regular passenger train was due to pass that point only 20 minutes 
after the freight had passed.

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