Stories of Haunted Railroads

By M.P. Pellicer | Stranger Than Fiction Stories
At the end of the 19th century, railway travel moved thousands from coast to coast, or within a state. It was a common, but at times dangerous mode of transportation, as can be attested by these ghost stories.

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Maine Central locomotive c.1854

In 1854, a strange report was made of an appearance on a Maine railroad. It was described as a phantom seen pushing a wheelbarrow at a "speed which astonishes all who have witnessed the spirit's performance."

The area was below Bath by a place called Blind Crossing, where a few years before a man was killed. A night train was approaching the place, when the engineer saw an object on the track. He rang the bell, but the figure moved aside only on time to miss being hit. The figure was so close that the engineer could see it was a man with a wheelbarrow pushing it forward at a rapid pace. He could hear the wheel "jumping and rumbling over the sleepers with a most unearthly rattling."

The engineer knew it could not be a flesh and blood person because who could roll a wheelbarrow over the icy track with so much speed.

He slowed the train, but the figure kept the same distance from the locomotive.

The apparition has been seen more than once, appearing in the shape half man, half elephant and "goes on before the locomotive with mighty strides and hideous roaring, enough to terrify the stoutest heart."

Others thought it was a ruse used to slow the train down in order to unload contraband from Canada. 

Was the figure a smuggler or perhaps a wheelbarrow-toting farmer that came to a more sinister end?

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Club Car on the Burlington Route

In 1860, it was said that "spectres, vampyre and goblins" are to be seen at night on the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad.

An engineer on the Hawkeye that while approaching Galesburgh said he saw a woman standing on the track about 10 feet ahead of the engine.

The train hurtled down the track at full speed and could not be stopped. The engineer remarked to the person on the engine that this would the first person he killed. They arrived at the railroad depot and he sent a search group back to the spot where he saw the woman. They found nothing, no blood or a body. In the morning another search scoured the area but again found nothing.

It was said that strange balls of light would seen, lighting up several acres of land in the area like if it was noon.

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During the summer of 1873, drivers and conductors on the Fort Street route in Detroit claimed having seen a lady specter who mysteriously boarded the last car at night and vanished from it. There were none who would go collect a fare from her.

It was described as:

About ten nights ago the conductor of the last car down, having no passengers beyond Twentieth Street, was standing in the front door talking with the driver, when he heard a rustle of silk and looked about to find a woman seated in the car. He wondered to himself at her agility boarding the car while the horses were on a trot, and after the car had passed along several blocks he started forward to collect her fare and to ask where she desired to stop. She had her face turned away from him, and as he put out his hand to touch her shoulder the lady vanished

Fort Street, facing east near Fifth Street, c.1871 (Source - Detroit Public Library)

The conductor said his hair stood on end and he felt a cold chill up his back. Every night afterwards, about six conductors claimed the ghostly lady boarded the last car, but only if there were no passengers. After riding several blocks, she disappeared. The lady was richly attired in winter clothing, made up of a shawl, a hood and muff. She was so closely veiled that it was difficult to make out her features.

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Rock Island locomotive #627, c.1880

It is the summer of 1877. A woman in white was said to appear around midnight at Chicago's Rock Island & Pacific Railroad. Engineer Moore on train No. 9 between Pearl and Pleasant Plain was walking up the track towards the engine, when he whistled for brakes when he thought that what he was seeing was a flesh and blood woman. 

When the figure in white was a few feet from him, she disappeared, however he saw her face that he described as "either that of a lunatic or somnambulist."

The following days, the figure was seen at different places on the track between two towns. Soon two other engineers saw the apparition.

Some believed she was the ghost of a married woman who was raped in a "terrible manner" near the place three years before. This occurred near the place where the specter was seen, as she died three weeks after the crime.

In 1877, a railroad in Nebraska also had the apparition of a woman in white walking towards a locomotive as it sped down the tracks and disappeared just in time to avoid a collision.

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Death of railroad engineer by Pemberton Ferry (Source - Weekly Floridian c.Mar. 1888)

In 1889, a bad accident occurred at the railroad bridge at Pemberton Ferry, Florida, where an engineer was killed, after he was thrown from the cab and was crushed to death by the engine. Less than a year later railroad men began talking of the weird noises heard on one portion of the track on the morning run. It spooked them so much they changed their runs.

The first to report it was the engineer on No. 24 while passing Elbow Creek, close to where the accident occurred. He was looking ahead when thought a big pine tree was lying across the track. He didn't have enough time to stop, but applied the air-brakes and reversed the engine. However a second before the engine would strike the tree, it plunged through thin air, and then a blood-curdling cry came from the track underneath. The train stopped down the track and the train men went to investigate. Nothing was found and it was only the engineer and the fireman who saw the strange vision  They were laughed at by the other workers.

Several nights after, the moon was out when they came down on the same section, and saw an engine coming toward them. It was only half a mile away. The headlight beamed, and the fire from the fire-box made shadows on the pine forests on either side.

The engineer once more reversed his engine and whistled for brakes, making ready to jump, but just before the engine was upon them it disappeared, and the track was empty. Again he heard the loud scream from the tracks. The area was inspected and nothing was found however this time, other trainmen had seen the engine. After this it became a weekly thing for one of the crew to have this type of experience.

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Pemberton Ferry Crossing

​Engine No. 36 while coming around a curve near the spot, had a new engineer who saw a tree lying across the track. He saw the struggling figure of a man held prostrate by the branches. The night was dark, but he made this out by the glare of the headlight. He reversed his engine, but like the other trains, it would be unable to stop before hitting the tree. However the train clattered on without smashing into anything, and the engineer heard loud shrieks fill the air coming from all sides.

The trainmen found the engineer half fainted, and the fireman was almost dead with fright. When they reached the end of the run the engineer resigned.

The other employees laughed at the stories but it was noticed that these railroad men always managed to be absent when a run was made at night over this stretch of road. The railroad found it difficult to find engineers to do the midnight run.

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Pullman sleeping car

Spooks in Sleepers

In 1891, stories were told by scared porters of haunted sleeping cars. Passengers who had experiences would be terrified and vow at the time they would never enter the car again, but the porters had no choice but to deal with the unusual experiences.

One of the stories retold was: 

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In the early days when Jim Fisk and Jay Gould controlled the Erie Railroad, the Pullman Company built two magnificent sleeping cars for the system called respectively 'Fisk' and 'Gould', after the names of the magnates. They  were heavily upholstered and richly supplied with elegant furnishings. The carving was of walnut and the monograms of the owners of the road were worked on the plate glass windows. The Fisk was run on the main line, between New York and Cincinnati. An old porter was in charge of the car, and he felt proud of his position. He worked on the car for 12 years, when he died of consumption and another man took his place, but he didn't stay long. Somebody, whom he never could catch, disarranged his work, and fixed up bedclothing and pillows to suit himself. It was supposed to be the ghost of the dead porter, who in life had become much attached to the car and whose spirit refused to leave it in death. Porter after porter was put on the sleeping coach, but each had the same experience, and finally it was impossible to keep anybody on the sleeper, and the Pullman Company had to break it into pieces, as they do with worn-out cars.

Erie Railroad, Hornellsville, NY

However the Fisk was not the only sleeper car that was rendered useless. This is the story about another one:

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Some years ago a wreck occurred on the Erie Road at Hornellsville. A man and his wife occupied berths in the sleeping car Bingen. The lady was in the lower and her husband slept in the upper berth. In the wreck the car was broken in half and the unfortunate woman was pinioned between the two section. She retained consciousness and shook hands with her husband, who was unhurt, telling him that she would die before she was extricated, and she did, though the men worked vigorously to chop up the timbers that held her. The car was repaired, and again ran on the road. The porters were constantly bothered by the bell ringing ever after, and the strange part of it was that the hand on the indicator never moved.

Cleveland Union Terminal

One of the porters said he heard the bell ring when he knew there was nobody in the car, and he got off and walked around the wheels and axles to see if someone was playing a joke on him.  

Again it became difficult to keep porters working on this car, and it had to be taken off the road. They felt sure it was the ghost of the poor woman who kept ringing the bell.

There was another incident which many believed produced another haunted sleeper. It was the Wagner sleeping car Somerfield, that ran on Lake Shore Road. The ghost was a lady who was standing on one of the platforms who fell off and was crushed to death under the wheels. People who rode in the car since the accident, and slept in the berth over the wheels, where she met her death claimed they were awakened by the screams of a woman coming from under the car. Loud at first then it would die away in the distance.

Another story detailed how a Pullman porter in Cleveland was arranging his car with the doors locked. He was pushing up an upper berth when a man and woman passed him. They were well-dressed and he spoke to them, but they didn't reply. He wondered where they had com from, especially after he found the doors were still locked. A woman was cleaning windows toward the front end of the car in the direction they had taken. The porter asked her if she had seen them, and she said no. He searched the car but couldn't find them anywhere. He refused to work on the car afterward.

​Sources - Janesville Daily Gazette, Green-Mountain Freeman, New York Times, ​Buffalo Morning Express, Buffalo Weekly Express, Pittsburgh Dispatch

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