The 1918 Dutchman’s Curve Disaster

A clear signal, a crowded morning, and a single stretch of track set the stage for one of America’s deadliest rail disasters. We take you inside the 1918 Dutchman’s Curve wreck in Nashville—where missed checks, wartime confusion, and the cruel logic of Jim Crow turned routine into catastrophe—then follow the people who tried to heal the damage and the reforms that followed.

We start with the world that built the accident: hand-thrown switches, wooden passenger cars, and crews stretched thin under federal wartime control. You’ll meet the unsung railway surgeons, forerunners of modern EMS, and step into the Shops junction where double track narrowed to one. As two sister locomotives—Nos. 281 and 282—raced toward each other, a failure to verify the tower log and mistaken assumptions sent one train onto the single track. The outcome was a head-on collision at over a hundred miles per hour combined, telescoping cars, ruptured boilers, and devastation that fell heaviest on Black passengers forced into the most dangerous cars by segregation.

From the first chaotic minutes—nuns running from St. Mary’s, bootleggers offering whiskey for pain, a Red Cross relief train packed with supplies—to the days of investigation, we lay out what went wrong and what changed. Hear how the Interstate Commerce Commission tallied casualties, why wooden coaches turned deadly, and how block systems, steel construction, and stricter safety protocols reshaped rail travel in the 1920s. We also confront the hard truth: policy and prejudice weren’t just ideas; they were risk assignments that cost lives at the front of the train.

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Special thank you to Lunarfall Audio for producing and doing all the heavy lifting on audio editing since April 13, 2025, the Murder of Christopher Meyer episode https://lunarfallaudio.com/

Transcript

From Hand Work To Disaster

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Trains today are safer than they have ever been. They used to be extremely dangerous, especially for the railroad workers. But everything was done by hand, from switching tracks, which meant someone had to be watching for other trains, to connecting rail cars together, which would require someone to physically go in between the cars to insert a pin to lock them together. With everything being done manually, this would inevitably lead to mistakes. Mistakes that would lead to serious injuries and death. In 1918, several mistakes were made that would lead to one of the largest rail accidents in the United States. So what happened? I'm Andrew, and this is History's A Disaster. Tonight we're driving this train into the Dutchman's Curve for the Great Train Wreck of 1918, one of, if not the largest rail accident in American history. And tonight's episode is brought to you by Moonlight, the world's dimmest flashlight. Is your flashlight too bright? Do you frequently blind yourself when turning on your flashlight? Or are you just tired of waking the whole house up when you're sneaking in at night when you turn those bright overhead lights on? Then you need the Moonlight flashlight, the dimmest flashlight available on the market. Perfect for barely being able to see in the dark. No more blinding yourself when you turn that gosh darn flashlight on in the middle of the night. The light is so dim no one else will even know it's on. The railroad, especially in the mid-19th century, was an exceptionally dangerous place to work. The work was so dangerous and so out in the middle of nowhere that it gave rise to an entire branch of medicine. The railway surgeons who would become the forerunners of both occupational health professionals and emergency medical services. While ambulances, or at least the idea of ambulances, has been around for hundreds of years, with the first recorded use of an ambulance being from the late 15th century, civilian ambulances were mostly ran by funeral homes. In these ambulances they were more concerned with transporting the wounded than providing any sort of care. The first paramedic programs would not start popping up in the States until the mid-1960s. So the closest thing to emergency care prior to the 60s was the railway surgeon, who worked for the railroads, so, you know, a company doctor. These surgeons were mostly general practitioners who performed surgeries and amputations. They were especially needed by the railroads as they expanded across the country. As the rail lines headed west into remote parts of the country, they could not count on there being any doctors around in an emergency. So they brought their own with them. And this eventually expanded into an entire medical system with staffing and funding coming from either the railroads themselves or the workers. Kind of like an early form of employer healthcare, except of course you went to their doctors. Which is usually terrible anytime a company says, hey, you have to use our doctors or shop at our stores with jack of prices, you know, dumb shit like that. But for the most part, the railway surgeons and medical organizations that followed would do a lot to advance health care, especially in the emergency medical sciences, and they would get a lot of practice at this. They helped not only the workers but train passengers. They would also go on to develop pre-employment physicals, which included vision and hearing tests, which were often critical, especially the color blindness test, have to be able to see and identify signals to avoid accidents. On top of all this, they would also have to run the company's hospitals. They acted as safety managers, inspecting rail cars for safety and working to improve workers' cleanliness. So obviously, the workers hated them, always telling them to wash behind their ears and not stick their hands in areas they could be crushed. They would also serve as the company's first responders. Doctors would be on call ready to rush to the site of an accident or waiting to bring in injured workers brought in on the train. In 1852, the Nashville and Northwestern Railway started laying down the track that would link Nashville with Northwest Tennessee. It was supposed to continue west to St. Louis, but in 1861, only a few miles were finished between Nashville and Kingston Springs when the Civil War broke out. War breaking out tends to put a dampener on things for some odd reason. The 168 mile of track was finally completed in 1867 between Nashville and Hickman, Kentucky. Train service between Nashville and Memphis would be established under an operating agreement with the Louisville and Nashville, using a connection at Mackenzie, Tennessee. The Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad leased the failing Nashville and Northwest Railway and ultimately absorbed it in 1873. The new railroad was renamed the Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis Railway. These rail lines really had such original names. In eighteen ninety, the new railroad opened a large complex they called New Shops, or the Shops, two miles west of downtown Nashville. Located on seventy acres, the complex included a foundry, boiler, blacksmith, coach and paint shops, and a forty stall roundhouse. And for reference, a roundhouse is a circular garage with workshops for working on locomotives and rail cars. Also of importance here, the rail lines coming in are double tracked and narrowed down to just a single track outside of the shops at the shops junction. So there would just be a single track going from here to Memphis? By nineteen seventeen, the railroads weren't exactly being ran right, at least according to the Interstate Commerce Commission. So in December of nineteen seventeen, they had the bright idea that the government should take control of the railroad industry. So President Woodrow Wilson issued a nationalization order. On march twenty first, nineteen eighteen, the Railroad Control Act was signed into law to help move troops and military material. The act put the entire US railway system under the control of the federal government for the duration of World War I. Government agents took over management of the railroads. And surprise, surprise, they fucked it all up. They made all kinds of changes to routes and schedules that messed up both the railroad workers and passengers. The trains were overcrowded and employees got stuck at work longer with all the changes. Not to mention being shorthanded since a lot of railroad workers were fighting over in Europe. On july ninth, the number four train was getting ready for their 7 AM departure time from Union Station in Nashville on the way to Memphis. The number four was being pulled by a steam locomotive engine number two hundred and eighty one. It consisted of two mail and baggage cars and six wooden coach cars. The number one train from Memphis was supposed to arrive in Nashville ten minutes after the number four left, but they were running a half hour behind. Gotta love those government schedules. The number one train was another steam locomotive engine, number two hundred eighty two, pulling a baggage car, six wooden coach cars, and two Pullman sleeping cars, which were made from steel, or at least had a steel frame versus the wooden frame of the regular coach cars. And the way these trains were set up? The cars were pulled with the mail and baggage cars directly behind the locomotive. Following that, the first passenger cars were for the African American passengers, and these were the shittiest cars to be in. Being in front of the train, they got hit with all the smoke and shit coming from the locomotive. They were also the most dangerous to be traveling in. In an accident they would take the most damage. The farther back on the train you are, the safer you are in an accident. So of course, they were on some racist shit with who rode up front in what they called the Jim Crow cars. These cars were often combined with the smoking cars or baggage cars, which just made them worse. They had less space and were more cramped than the cars behind them. The coach cars behind them would be the men's cars, or white men's anyway. And the last car was the ladies' car, because it just wouldn't be proper for men and women to travel together. Well, for white men and women anyways. African American women had to ride in the front cars too. And this glass car was also the safest car to be in in an accident, as well as being the furthest away from the heat and smoke put out by the locomotive. Both trains were packed and overcrowded. Most of the passengers were soldiers traveling cross country from one base to another, or a large group of African American workers on their way to a new DuPont munitions plant in Old Hickory for work. Before leaving Union Station, the train engineer, David Kennedy, met conductor JP Eubanks outside the telegraph office to get the latest information of what was going on up and down the tracks. There he received orders from the superintendent to wait at the shop area for the number one train to come in from Memphis. And then once it came by, they were to go out to Harding Station and meet the number seven train from Waverly to pick up some mail. When the train was underway, both the porter and conductor were out doing their jobs and ended up meeting at the entrance of one of the regular coach cars. Being overcrowded, Eubanks was falling behind collecting tickets and was stressing out about it along with having to watch out for the other train that was supposed to be passing them, going the other way at any minute. So supposedly the porter told him not to worry about it, he'd keep an eye out for it. This was also something that some of the other crew were doing as well, including the train's fireman up in the locomotive cab. It was very important they spotted the train. This section of tracks was a double track, but after they passed the shops it drops down to a single track. While Kennedy was pulling into the shops, the number one overnight express train was ten miles down the road, heading in his direction at full steam. The train from Memphis was being driven by engineer Bill Lloyd. This locomotive also just happened to be the twin sister of Kennedy's train coming from Nashville, which is why their numbers are so close, number two hundred eighty one and two hundred eighty two. They were both manufactured at the same time. This was also supposed to be Lloyd's last run. He was retiring after this trip. So it was one of those just one more job type deals. The number four pulled up to the signal tower, which is a wooden tower with hinged arms that sent signals and warnings to train engineers. The signal tower was set to show the track ahead was clear and it was safe to proceed. So Kennedy asked around if the train that had just gone through the area in the opposite direction was the number one from Memphis. After being told yes, the number one had gone through by others on the train, Kennedy pulled out of the shops area onto the single track section, not knowing that people had been mistaken and that the train that had been passed was not the number one from Memphis that went through. As it was passing the signal tower, the tower operator JS Johnson noted the train in his logbook and seen there was no log for the number one train passing through, something that Kennedy and Eubanks failed to check. Per a recent company policy, the conductor and engineer should have stopped at the tower to personally verify the logbook and not just assume the signals were correct. Johnson ran after the train, blowing the emergency whistle. However, there was no one in the rear of the train to hear and understand what the whistle was. A group of men near the track saw the operator was yelling at the train to stop and joined in by waving their hats in the air at the train, but to no avail, nobody saw them. Kennedy just blew the whistle and sped away from the shops. They were fast approaching a series of S curves known as Dutchman's Curve. As Kennedy brought the train through the last blind curve, he saw smoke in the air near the white bridge. As smoke from both engines drifted in the air, Kennedy quickly leapt from his spot and pulled the emergency brake, praying they could stop in time. Both locomotives were running at or over fifty miles per hour, so when they met up on the single track, one hundred and sixty tons of iron smashed into each other with a combined speed of over one hundred miles per hour. Both of the locomotives were forced upward into the air. Burning coal was sent flying through the cabs and steaming hot water spilled down to the ground as the boilers were ripped from the wheels below. The locomotives were smashed and thrown into the nearby courtfields. The engineers and fire stokers in both locomotives were killed instantly in the head on collision. As the trains smashed into each other, the sudden stop caused the cars behind the locomotive to telescope into others, meaning the force pushed them through and into the other cars ahead, smashing the cars themselves and anything in their paths. One of the Jim Crow cars of the number four train went through the baggage car in front of it. Men and women inside were trapped between the walls of the two cars as it was forced onwards. The cars behind it ended up piled high in the air. From the number one train, the cars derailed into the surrounding cord fields, smashing into nearby telephone poles and tearing through the fields. The dead and injured were tossed and scattered amongst the debris filled fields. The last three cars of the number four train were the only ones not derailed, managing to escape the worst of the accident with only some minor damage. The sound of the crash could be heard from miles away. The nuns and children at St. Mary's Orphanage, the crew of the number seven train waiting nearby at Harding Station, local farmers in their fields, and motorists driving over the bridge all heard it. Everyone dropped what they were doing and came running quickly, hoping to help in any way they could and with any tools they had. With debris scattered all over the cornfields and fires breaking out in several locations throughout the wreckage, the first people on the scene had a hell of a time getting through to help out. The nuns from the orphanage came down to offer aid and were taking people who were lightly injured up to the orphanage where they could get cleaned up and rested while they waited for more help. West Nashville bootleggers came out with their whiskey and were freely passing it out to people to help dull their pain. Something that the cops on scene would turn a blind eye to, you know, since prohibition and that bullshit was going on. By nine AM, the Red Cross relief train arrived. The recently established Nashville Chapter of the Red Cross brought a train car and packed it full of medical supplies, blankets, places to store ice, and everything else they thought they could possibly need, along with filling it with doctors and nurses. Almost every doctor and nurse was called in and put to work with the growing number of injured coming from the trains. The less seriously injured were treated at the scene, the dying were made as comfortable as possible, and the more seriously injured were taken to local hospitals by whatever means was available, which was mostly farmers tractors and trailers. An estimated forty thousand people showed up at the scene. Most came to help out, others came to stare because there's always people wanting to see a good wreck. Others came to loot the wreckage, snatching up souvenirs from the debris or going through scattered luggage. Cranes and maintenance crews were called in to start clearing away the wreckage. They had to get the track cleared so regular train travel could continue. Gotta keep up that schedule the government managed to screw up. And by later in the day they would have enough cleared that train travel could continue. The death toll grew throughout the day and coming weeks, starting at one hundred twenty one fatalities reported by the Tennessean newspaper the next day. But the final number given by the Interstate Commerce Commission was one hundred and one dead and over a hundred injured. Most of the fatalities were the African American workers traveling to Old Hickory and soldiers. Of the one hundred and one killed in the accident, nearly ninety of them were African American. Two days after the accident, an investigation was launched by the Interstate Commerce Commission, the US Federal Railroad Administration, and the Nashville Terminals of the Railway to determine blame. Several safety concerns were discovered, such as the lack of modern signal system, a properly operated manual block system on the single track line north of the shots, and that if the passenger cars would not have been made of wood but steel instead, a lot of the deaths could have possibly been avoided. They also went on to put the blame for the accident on engineer David Kennedy for going through the shots without verifying the logbook and on Johnson, the tower operator for not having the proper signal put up. Which is a bit unfair to Johnson. It is to my understanding that he had been on shift for less than ten minutes when the train went through, so he would not have had time to properly check the logbooks and verify the proper signals were put up. So what the hell was the guy doing on the shift before? The accident devastated and outraged the African American community and any opponents to segregation because of the dangerous location of the Jim Crow cars, since most of the victims that died from the accident were African American. And this would lead to further calls to finally end segregation. They wanted to put an end to the PC vs. Ferguson decision from eighteen ninety six that legalized segregation in public facilities, as long as the facilities were equal in quality. The whole separate but equal doctrine bullshit which never quite worked out the way they said it was going to. Unfortunately, this decision wouldn't be overruled until the nineteen fifty four Brown vs. Board of Education case. Kennedy's widow would go on to sue the railway company two years later for compensation and also to clear her husband's reputation. After three days of testimony, Kennedy was awarded with a judgment of eight thousand dollars under the Federal Employers Liability Act, but this decision was reversed by the Supreme Court in nineteen twenty four. Both locomotives would end up being rebuilt in nineteen nineteen and put back into service. They would go on to serve the railroad until nineteen forty seven and nineteen forty eight when they were both sold for scrap. The collision would also push the railroad to finally get rid of these shitty wooden cars and switch to cars with all steel construction. They would also end up putting in a block system to prevent trains from entering the single track area all willy nilly without getting proper approval first. There was also a major push nationwide to improve signals and communications for what's going on on the tracks. Safety protocols were tightened with stricter safety checks enforced. Railroad companies by the mid nineteen twenties got significantly better when dealing with safety concerns. And that was the Dutchman's Curve Train Wreck of nineteen eighteen. Thanks for listening, and if you like the show, please consider leaving a rating or review on your Apple Choice. And you can reach out to the show at historiesadisaster at gmail dot com with questions, comments, or suggestions. As well as following the show on social media like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, whatever, there's a few out there. And share the episode. Your friends will love it. Now, go out there and go for a train ride. Enjoy the scenery. Take a penguin. They love train rides. Chase that dream. Live for today. Because tomorrow is never guaranteed. Thanks and goodbye.