HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY                      411

others, by vigorous kicking and other means, broke down the door, all
aboard of the coach escaping with their lives, several of them slightly
injured by scratches, bruises and sprains. Within less than fifteen min-
utes after the coach was vacated all its combustible parts were consumed,
only the iron-ribbed skeleton left.
    It was then dark, and on lining up the number aboard on leaving
Brazil Engineer Yelton was missing, which could be accounted for only
on the presumption that he had been caught and crushed under the cab
of the engine. A messenger was dispatched to Brazil to wire headquar-
ters at Evansville for relief, when the Vandalia dispatched a local to the
scene of the disaster. Meanwhile, by the use of an axe and a grubbing-
hoe, procured from a nearby farm house, the cab was broken into parts
and the lifeless body of the engineer found, both scalded and crushed.
In the crash an iron stay-rod had been broken and one end forced through
his thigh, pinning him completely to the ground, so that, to remove the
body, an excavation had to be made under the heavy frame-work to afford
the space for extricating it by forcing it downward. As told by the fire-
man, who was badly but not fatally scalded, both he and the engineer
had jumped from the cab in the hope of saving their lives.
    The whole party, with the body of the engineer, were taken back to
Brazil, when Coroner Samuel Slavens, of Staunton, was summoned and
an inquest held before the hour of midnight. About one o’clock a. m.
another Evansville & Indianapolis crew arrived from Terre Haute by
way of Saline City with engine and coach and took the passengers to
their respective destinations. The only lady passenger in the party was
Miss Lola Moss, of Center Point, then a teacher in the Brazil public
schools, who lost her jewelry, including a gold watch, in a small mahog-
any casket, which, in the confusion, thinking only of her personal safety,
she had neglected to take up and carry out with her. She afterward
recovered value from the company.
    The derailment was due to an open switch, but how the switch came
to be open was a mystery never cleared up. It had not been thrown by
any of the train crew, as it was not then being used. The current and
popular report in explanation was that a mule pasturing in the woods
alongside the road, just then crossing the track, was struck by the pilot
and forced up against the switch bar, throwing open the switch. After
the contact, having no bones broken, the mule got up and roamed leis-
urely about the pasture grounds as usual, and continued to serve its mas-
ter in harness just as before this experience. In verification of this solu-
tion as to the cause of the disaster, the fact (as claimed) was cited that
on the day following hair was found on the track at this point correspond-
ingin color and fiber with that of the mule.
    Among the passengers aboard were John W. White, Zaccheus Wills,
William Travis and King, of Clay City, and William Grayson, of
Saline City, of whom White and Grayson collected damages from the
company for injuries sustained.
A Pioneer Frozen to Death.
    “Uncle Ben Phipps,” familiarly so known in pioneer times, the father
of Sampson and William Phipps, who lived on what is now the Henry
R. Edmonson place, in Harrison township, was frozen to death one night
in the winter of 1840, on the present John W. Sutton place, when intoxi-
cated and trying to find his way home from New Brunswick, a distance
of a mile and a half. When found the following morning his body lay