Hamlet, NC Train Wreck, Jul 1906 - Railway Disaster Sites on Waymarking.com

The following is from the book "Scalded to Death by the Steam" by Katie Letcher Lyle (1983 Algonquin Books):

"OPn the clear hot morning of Thursday, July 27, 1911, a Seaboard Air Lines dispatcher sent an order advising an eastbound freight train that all overdue passenger trains had arrived in Hamlet, North Carolina. But the dispacher had forgotten that there was coming through that morning a special train, Second No. 33, carrying 912 black passengers from Durham to Charlotte for a day's excursion. The occasion was the annual outing of the St. Joseph's African Methodist Episcopal Sunday School. Many of the travellers had never been so far from home. They had left Durham at 7:15. At 10:40 A.M., this special train crashed headlong into the slowly moving freight train in the Hamlet yards, right in front of the roundhouse.

The passenger train was jam packed. There were seven wooded coaches, each designed to hold 50 people. There were 912 people on the train. The crash called the whole town to the scene. Rescuers cut away the sides of the cars to free those still alive, who were then laid on the ground under the repair shed, where doctors and nurses from nearby Rockingham and Laurinburg ministered to them Sixty people were seriously injured and eight were killed outright, with another two to die later in the next few days."

North Carolina Folklorist Frank C. Brown collected a version of a negro spiritual called 'The Hamlet Wreck' which he published in his book, "Folk Music of the Rails":

See the women and children all going to the train.
Fare-you-well, my husband, if I never see you again.
The engineer turned his head
When he saw so many were dead.
So many have lost their lives.

Isn't it sad, isn't it sad?
Excursion left Durham, going to Charlotte, North Carolina.
Isn't it sad, isn't it sad?
So many have lost their lives.

Some of us have mothers standing at the train.
Farewell-well-well, my daughter, I may never see you again.
And the train began to fly
And some didn't come back alive.
So many have lost their lives.

Isn't it sad, isn't it sad?
Excursion left Durham, going to Charlotte, North Carolina.
Isn't it sad, isn't it sad?
So many have lost their lives.

The ruins of the old roundhouse are in the woods across the tracks in private land owned by pee dee electric. It was torn down in the 1950's. There is really nothing to see and they have very strict rules about tresspassing. Do NOT try to find them!!

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Date Logged Log User Rating   11/20/2015 NCDaywalker visited it