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Charley Knight And The Ghost Of Pinky Cowan

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Chapter One

Charley Knight was a young man, just eighteen, when he hired himself out as a trainman. He was assigned the duties of a brakeman. In those days, a brakeman had to get out on railroad cars to set retainers and tighten brakes as the train wound its way from the top to the bottom of a hill.

There were two sizable hills on the Chama/ Durango run: Monero-Amargo and Bocea Hill out of Durango. Bocea Hill was the steepest hill on the Durango/Chama nexus. It was a 3% grade. Bocea Hill, coming from the direction of Chama, was always a challenge for train crews. It had horseshoe curves. It had gullies capable of derailing an engine during a storm. Dangerous shale rock cliffs hung over the track. More than once engineers and firemen had to ride out slides, hoping all the while that the engine wouldn't capsize.

Charley Knight gained experience on every run he worked. Fortunately, he wasn't aboard when this particular, serious wreck occurred.

One cold January night, a double-header wound its way down Bocea Hill. The two engines were the 207 and the 408. The old 207 was in the lead. The head-end brakeman had set the retainers on most of the boxcars to brake the speed momentum on the grade. To be safe, the other brakeman (there were two) tied down brakes on some of the gondola cars too. As the train approached the first horseshoe curve, all was well. The brakemen waved their lanterns at the firemen. Each engine had a fireman and an engineer. Only Pinky Cowan waved back. He was the fireman on the lead engine that night, the 207.

Pinky was one of the Alamosa guys. Several of them were working that run to earn extra money. It was said that the Farmington Branch was a "God send" for the men from Alamosa. They would have only been listed on the extra board there, filling in for other workers, but in Durango they had regular jobs. Pinky waved again as the engines went out of sight on rounding a curve.

Wilson Gulch was the most dreaded feature of Bocea Hill. The Gulch was riddled with twists and turns and had many small trestles. The engines came back into view on the south side of the Gulch. They left the Gulch and drifted onto a shale wall and then onto sand. All the while, snow was blowing that night. A mixture of sand, shale, and snow the consistency of sugar blew into the brakemen's faces. The engineers and firemen were beating it away in order to improve visibility. The head engineer blew his whistle to no avail. The engines were working desperately now as sand piled up.

Suddenly, a terrifying screech broke into the night silence. It came from the lead engine. The 207 was skidding off the rails, first heading toward and then tumbling over the down side of the hill. The quick-witted engineer on the 408 engine had the good sense to cut his air line from the lead engine. The 207 stopped its descent and the second engine, the 408, stayed upright. However, train cars plowed into the second engine. They soon lost momentum and halted. Nonetheless, several cars were now stacked on top of one another.

The conductor had been in the caboose looking out the cupola window when the train jolted to a stop. He fell to the floor of the caboose and was knocked unconscious. For their part, the two brakemen held onto the brake wheels atop the cars for their dear lives. Brake clubs were useless and dropped by the wayside in the dark. The lanterns of both brakemen were cast to the ground and shattered.

When at last the train and the clattering sounds stopped, there was an eerie silence. Mysteriously the wind, which had been blowing, died down. The brakemen haltingly clambered down the ladders of their respective boxcars. After several minutes they rushed to the caboose and found Jim Feifer, the Charley Knight And The Ghost Of Pinky Cowan conductor. They managed to rouse him. The head-end brakeman, Wilmer Simms, began fashioning a bandage for the conductor's scalp wound. All agreed that the conductor was in no condition to go forward to the disabled engine and take command.

The hind-end brakeman, Hank Warren, took the conductor's lantern and walked back behind the wreck about three hundred yards to set out flares, along with a lantern and torpedoes. He did this to prevent another train from overtaking the wreck. This accomplished, he turned and walked back to the caboose.

Brakeman Wilmer Simms was busy caring for Jim Feifer. It was miserably cold. The fire had gone out in the caboose stove. He got the fire going, and then he unrolled the conductor's bedroll onto his cot and helped him settle into it.

Several old lanterns were in the storage cabinet. Brakeman Simms got two and trimmed the wicks. They would have to do in this emergency.

The brakemen hurried toward the front of the train on the south side. They could see lights from the 408. As they got closer, it was clear that the 207 engine was over the side of the hill. They counted only three men standing beside the 408. They knew there should have been four. Hank Warren in a choked voice said, "Maybe somebody got hurt."

As they approached, they could make out the scrambled boxcars. They skirted the battered cars and came upon the 408 engine. Two engineers and one fireman stood staring at the capsized engine, the 207.

They reported that Pinky Cowan was dead. "He didn't have a chance. The 207 rolled over him. He was crushed underneath the tender." The engineer of the 207 recounted that he had jumped only seconds before the engine capsized. He said he heard Pinky scream as the engine and tender rolled over. When they came to rest, all was quiet.

The engineer of the 207 was badly shaken by the wreck. The death of Pinky Cowan had him, and the others, in shock. Brakeman Simms went to the left side of the tender and flashed a lantern up and down the engine and tender. He was revolted by what he saw. A boot and one of Pinky Cowan's hands was visible from under the heavy mass. Pinky's broken lantern rested nearby in the snow-laden weeds.

The hind-end brakeman, Hank Warren, was now in command. While the conductor was usually in charge, Conductor Feifer wasn't able to function. Brakeman Warren wasn't familiar with the telephone or the telegraph. He asked the engineer of the 207 what to do. The engineer said the easiest call box to reach was two miles away at Carbon Junction. It was extremely dark now. The time was 4:30 a.m. and it looked like it would begin to earnestly snow at any moment.

Warren said to no one in particular, "Well, I'll be back with help. Maybe I can get a bridge gang out to at least pull the tender off of Pinky."

He turned to Wilmer Simms, the other brakeman. "You should look in on Jim Feifer and see if he is all right. After that, go see if the lantern behind the train is still burning. You'd better refuel it. See that the torpedoes are not covered with snow. And to be on the safe side, get three more torpedoes and go out one hundred yards farther than I did when I put the other flares down." He shook his head. "I hope the conductor will be all right."

With that he turned and walked away in the direction of Carbon Junction. In no time at all his form was swallowed in darkness and the falling snow.

Warren walked along on the ties. It was slow going. The ties were not in good order. A few were fabricated from cedars that had been hacked...