Another feature which often involves discomfort, and occasionally positive suffering and danger, is "going back to flag." When a train is unexpectedly stopped upon the road, the brakeman at the rear end must immediately take his red flag or lantern and go back a half-mile or more to give the "stop" signal to the engine-men of any train that may be following. This rule is sometimes disregarded in clear weather on straight lines, and is even evaded by lazy or unfaithful brakemen where the neglect is positively dangerous, but still many a faithful man has to go out and stand for a long time in a severe snow-storm or risk his life in walking several miles to a station. The record of individual perils and heroisms in the New York blizzard of March, 1888, are paralleled, or at least repeated, on a slightly milder scale, by brakemen every winter. Even in the blizzard country of the Northwest, where a half hour's exposure is often fatal, the system of train-running is such that the stopping of a train at an unexpected place involves danger of collision if the brakeman does not at once go back and stay back. A "tail-end" brakeman has various anxieties, which cannot be detailed here. Often there is a possibility that the advancing engineer will not see his red lantern. One brakeman in New Brunswick several years ago ignominiously deserted his post, leaving his train to look out for itself, because of a visit from a huge bear whose residence was in the woods near the point on the railroad where the brakeman was keeping his lonely night-vigil.
Coupling.
The danger of sudden accidental death or maiming is constant and great, and the bare record of the numerous cases is acutely suggestive of inexpressible suffering; but, strange to say, it does not worry the average brakeman much. Though probably a thousand trainmen are killed in this country every year, and four or five thousand injured, by collisions and derailments, in coupling cars, falling off trains, striking low overhead bridges, and from other causes, not one brakeman, from what he sees in his own experience, realizes the danger very vividly. As in other dangers which are constant but inevitable, familiarity breeds carelessness which is closely akin to contempt. Falling from trains is really a serious danger, because the most ceaseless caution—next to impossible for the average man to maintain—is necessary to avoid missteps. This will be practically abolished when the long-wished-for air-brake comes into use, as that will obviate the necessity of riding on the tops of the cars.
Coupling accidents are practically unavoidable because, although the necessary manipulations can be made without going between the cars or placing the hands in dangerous situations, the men as a general thing prefer to take the risk of the more dangerous method. With the ordinary freight-car apparatus (which, however, is destined to be superseded by an automatic coupler) the link by which the cars are connected is retained by a pin in the drawbar of either car; as one car approaches another at considerable speed, this link, which hangs loosely down at an angle of thirty degrees, must be lifted and guided into the opening in the opposite drawbar. This operation must, according to the regulations of most roads, be performed by the aid of a short stick; but, disregarding the regulation, partly to save time and partly because of fear of the ridicule that would be called out by the exhibition of a lack of dexterity, the average brakeman uses his fingers. He must lift the link and hold it horizontally until the end enters the opening, and then withdraw his hand before the heavy drawbars come together. A delay of a fraction of a second would crush the hand or finger as under a trip-hammer. And, in point of fact, this delay does, for various reasons, frequently happen, and the number of trainmen with wounded hands to be found in every large freight-yard is sad evidence of the fact. But again, assuming that this part of the operation is accomplished in safety, there is another and worse danger in the possibility of being crushed bodily. Cars are built with projecting timbers on their ends at or near the centre, for the purpose of keeping the main body of each car twelve or fifteen inches from its neighbor; but cars of dissimilar pattern sometimes meet in such a way that the projections on one lap past those on the other, and the space which should afford room for the man to stand in safety is not maintained. If the brakeman, in the darkness of night or the hurry of his work, fails to note the peculiarities of the cars, he is mercilessly crushed, the ponderous vehicles often banging together with a force of many tons. A constant danger in coupling and uncoupling is the liability to catch the feet in angles in the track.[33] Freight conductors are peculiarly liable to this, as the duty of uncoupling (pulling out the coupling-pin) generally devolves upon them, and must be done while the train is in motion. Walking rapidly along, in the dark, with the right hand holding a lantern and grasping the car, while the left is tugging at a pin which sticks, involves perplexities wherein a moment's hesitation may prove fatal.
The dangers here recounted are those which only brakemen (or those acting as brakemen) have to meet. The liability of all trainmen to be killed by the cars tumbling down a bank, colliding with another train, and a hundred other conditions, is also considerable. The horror which the public feels on the occurrence of such a disaster as that at Chatsworth, Ill., in the summer of 1887, or the half-dozen other terrible ones within the past few years, could reasonably be repeated every month if railroad employees instead of passengers were considered. There are no accurate official statistics kept of the train accidents in the country, but the accounts compiled monthly by the Railroad Gazette always show a large number of casualties to railroad men from causes beyond their own control (collisions, running off the track, etc.), no mention being made of the larger number resulting from the victims' own want of caution. In the month of March, 1887, in which occurred the terrible Bussey Bridge disaster, near Boston, 25 passengers were killed in the United States; but the same month recorded 34 employees killed. At Chatsworth 80 passengers were killed; but in that and the following month the number of employees killed in the country reached 97. In both of these comparisons the number of passengers is exceptional, while that of employees is ordinary. But, as already intimated, these dangers and discouragements are distributed over such a large territory and among such a large number of individuals that the general serenity of the brakeman's life is not much disturbed by them. In spite of them all, he enjoys his work and, if he is adapted to the calling, he sticks to it.
The Pleasant Part of a Brakeman's Life.
The brakeman must be on hand promptly at the hour of his train's preparation for departure, and generally he must do his part in 15, 30, or 60 minutes' lively work in assembling cars from different tracks, changing them from the front to the rear or middle of the train, and setting aside those that are broken or disabled; but, once on the road, by far the greater portion of his time is his own, for his own enjoyment, almost as fully as that of the passenger who travels for the express purpose of entertaining himself. In mild weather and in daylight, life on the top of a freight train is almost wholly devoid of unpleasant features, and it takes on the nature of work only for the same reason that any routine becomes more or less irksome after a time. Much of the time there are a few bushels of cinders from the engine flying in the air, which a novice can get into his eyes with great facility, but the brakeman gets used to them. He sees every day (on many roads) the beauties of nature in great variety. Much of the scenery of the adjoining country is 500 per cent. more enjoyable from the brakeman's perch on the roof than from the car windows, for the reason that the increased height gives such an enlarged horizon. This education from nature is an element in railroad men's lives not to be despised. The trainman whose daily trips take him past the panoramic charms of the Connecticut Valley in summer, through the gorgeous-hued mountain-foliage along the Erie in autumn, or the perennial grandeur of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, certainly enjoys a privilege for which many a city worker would gladly make large sacrifices. But to trainmen the refining influence of these surroundings is often an unconscious influence, and with the majority of them is perhaps generally so, because of the prosaic round of every-day thoughts filling their minds. There are also some other advantages, not wholly unæsthetic, which a millionaire might almost envy the freight trainman. Every twenty miles or so the engine must stop for water, and it often happens that this is in a cool place where the men can at the same time refresh themselves with spring water whose sparkling purity is unknown in New York or Chicago. Though brakemen who love beer are not by any means scarce, an accessible spring or well of pure water along the line always finds appreciative users during warm weather; and the Kentuckian who sojourned six months in Illinois without thinking to try the water there is not represented in the ranks of level-headed brakemen. A certain railroad president regales himself in summer on spring water brought in jugs from 100 miles up the road by trainmen who find in this service an opportunity to "make themselves solid" at headquarters. Freight trainmen get all the delicious products of the soil at first hands. In their stops at way-stations they get acquainted with the farmers, and can make their selection of the best things at low prices, thus (if they keep house) living on fruits, vegetables, etc., of a quality fit for a king.