A Shattered Stuy Heights Community Picks Up the Pieces of the Grisly 1897 Tally-Ho Disaster, Part 2

On Memorial Day 1897, a group of young adults from Stuyvesant Heights’ Green Avenue Baptist Church was involved in a horrible collision between an open horse-drawn coach and a Long Island Railroad train. Last week we shared Part 1 of the story. We now pick up as the investigations and funerals continue.

The horrible crash took place on May 31, 1897. The first of the funerals began on June 3. Although it was common custom to have a funeral at home, the families of Leslie Roberts, Winslow Lewis and George Pashley decided to have a joint funeral for their sons at the Greene Avenue Baptist Church.

The church had to issue tickets for the funeral in order to assure that invited family and friends were able to get into the building. A large crowd of people waited in the street.

The horse-drawn hearses arrived at the church and pushed their way to the doorway. The caskets were carried into the church by boys’ friends and families. Some of the pallbearers were boys who had survived the crash.

Dorothea Bertsch’s funeral was private, held in her home at 259 Stuyvesant Avenue. Dora, as she was called, was one of 10 children of Peter Bertsch and his deceased wife Emilie.

Peter Bertsch was a successful carriage maker with a factory in Bushwick. He was the captain in the 47th Regiment National Guard unit, and the president of the Arion Society and, later, the Schwabenbund, two of Bushwick’s important German singing societies.

While Dora’s distraught father sat at his daughter’s funeral, her sister, Emma, lay at death’s door in the hospital, a victim of the same accident. She was not expected to recover. The papers said Captain Bertsch was inconsolable and destroyed. He would soon turn that grief into anger and a lawsuit.

The tally-ho disaster’s fifth victim, William Gilchrist, also had a funeral at home. Rumor had it that William and Dora were engaged to be married, though neither family would confirm it.

It was said that in the long seconds before the fatal crash, the couple embraced, William trying to shield Dora with his body. He did not succeed and his body was severely damaged and broken; she remained untouched, save for the spear of wood in her brain that ended her life.

259 Stuyvesant Avenue, the Bertsch family’s home in 1897. Photo by Christopher Bride for PropertyShark

The Official Investigation and the Blame Game Begins

The investigations and hearings regarding the cause of the crash began as soon as funerals were over. The testimony went on for weeks. It all boiled down to bells and whistles.

The train crossing on Merrick Road did not have attendants or a retractable fence. The train’s approach was supposed to trigger a loud electric bell that rang well before the train came into view.

In addition, the engineer was required to sound his own whistle, warning those near the road that he was approaching.

Many witnesses were called to the coroner’s hearings. They included passengers on the train, the engineer, bicyclists from the outing, the carriage driver and other survivors of the crash, as well as locals who lived or worked near the tracks.

Did the track warning bell sound to warn the tally-ho? Did the train engineer sound his own whistle well before reaching the crossing? There were yeses and nos to both answers.

Tally-ho coach in the 1890s. Photo via State of the Ozarks

Several neighbors, drivers on the road at the time, bicyclists and victims testified that they heard no warning bell. Several testified as to hearing the train’s whistle, but not the bell. The bell in question was a large, heavy one, attached to a pole at the intersection. The railroad insisted that it was in working order.

The train’s engineer testified that he sounded his own whistle as he approached the crossing. Several other people testified that they heard this warning, but the train was less than 100 feet from the crossing when they did.

A Hempstead engineer named Thomas D. Smith was called on to testify as to the physical conditions of the crossing. He prepared diagrams that showed that the crossing was 26 feet wide. If someone was standing on the road, in the center of the tracks, they were able to see up the tracks some 1,300 feet up, past the point where the bell trigger was located.

But beyond that point, the tracks were obscured by bushes and overgrowth. He testified that a man in an elevated seat, such as in a tally-ho coach, would have an obscured view.

The driver of the coach, William Henderson, was still recovering from a skull fracture and concussion. He missed the first hearing and a warrant went out for his arrest. It was recalled when his doctor reported that he was unable to testify.

He appeared in court several days later, still unsteady on his feet. He testified that the fateful trip was his first time on Merrick Road, and he was unaware there was a railroad crossing. He said that the kids on the coach were not so loud that he couldn’t hear a warning bell.

As he approached the crossing, he heard nothing and saw no train. He said that he didn’t see the train until it was upon him, and he managed to get the team of horses across the tracks, but not all of the coach.

Several other people testified, some very compellingly. No one could remember hearing the warning bell. One local Valley Stream man who owned an inn nearby told the court that he thought the bell had been malfunctioning for at least a month.

He testified that the bell would sound at all hours of the day and night, and no trains would pass. But he had noticed several occasions when trains would pass with no warning bell at all. He did not report this to the railroad, and no one from the railroad had been around to check.

One of the last witnesses was Thomas Hall Wyatt, an electrical engineering student who was one of only two passengers on the tally-ho to not be seriously injured. He told the court that the group had stopped at a rest stop right before the crash, and everyone had stopped blowing their horns.

He went on to say that they couldn’t see the train or the track until they were right on it. He said they only saw both instants before the crash. The train had sounded its whistle twice, as the engineer saw the coach on the tracks and slammed on the brake.

His third whistle was still blowing as the train smashed into the rear of the coach. Wyatt testified that the tally-ho driver had done all that was humanly possible to get the coach across the tracks, but he just didn’t have time. Young Wyatt saw no fault in the actions of William Henderson.

Not all of the testimony was against the railroad. There were witnesses who testified that the accident was the fault of the coachman, William Henderson. They testified that he ignored the bells and whistles and was careless in his driving.

Greene Avenue Baptist Church, now Antioch Baptist. Photo by Suzanne Spellen

The Verdict and the Aftermath

After several weeks of hearings and testimony, the coroner’s hearing was over. On June 25, 1893, the nine-member coroner’s jury came back with a verdict. They found the Long Island Railroad to be criminally negligent in not maintaining the bell at the crossing.

The jury ruled that just because the railroad was not required by law to have a manned gate or fencing at this dangerous intersection, they were required to make sure the bell worked at all times. They had not.

Because of this, the tally-ho was not warned of the train’s arrival until it stood across the tracks, when it was far too late.

While all of this was going on, lawyers were preparing lawsuits filed on behalf the dead, the injured, the families of the dead and injured, and the emotional distress of some of the witnesses.

They sued everyone in sight, the church that organized the event, the Long Island Railroad and the livery stable, as well as the engineer on the train, the coach driver and individual members of the LIRR board of directors. Suits against the church were eventually dropped.

Many of the cases went to trial toward the end of 1897. The new president of the LIRR said that he would not fight legitimate claims. The railroad’s lawyers tried to minimize the damage.

During many of the trials they tried to place the blame on the livery driver and even on the passengers themselves. It didn’t work. Claims as high as $50,000 were settled, but lives were ruined all around.

There were the five dead and their families, of course. Many of the injured were physically disabled for life. Mrs. Newell Andrus, the chaperone who was riding on the coach, sued the railroad because of her injuries.

Her legs were broken in two places. Her husband sued separately for his own pain and suffering in having to deal with a disabled wife.

The Henderson Livery Stables was forced out of business because of the many suits against them and their driver.

Peter Bertsch’s hospitalized daughter Emma woke up months after the accident with no memory of the event. She asked her father when she and her sister were going on the tally-ho ride.

That December, as the lawsuits were coming to trial, including his own, another Bertsch daughter, 18-year-old Ella, died suddenly at home. She had not been on the tally-ho ride. Before he died in 1906, Peter Bertsch lost his wife and seven of his 10 children.

The railroad, as the only deep pocket here, settled many of the suits, and fought others and won. After several more incidents, including one in 1901 where a LIRR employee was killed, the railroad was called on to do something.

The Brooklyn Eagle demanded that they either have crossing guards at all graded stops or install drop-down gates. Anything else was unacceptable.

Eventually, the most dangerous of crossings had gates installed. Warning bells were also upgraded and improved. Federal and state laws were changed to improve safety. The tally-ho disaster faded into obscure LIRR train lore.

[Top photo: LIRR crossing at Bedford Avenue in the 1890s via Brooklyn Public Library]

Related Stories
In 1897, a Tally-Ho Ride From Stuyvesant Heights to Long Island Went Horribly Wrong
Building of the Day: 828 Greene Avenue (former Greene Avenue Baptist Church)
Building of the Day: 13 Arion Place (Arion Hall)