Civil War Prison Train Wreck
Shohola Township, Pike County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
On July 15, 1864, an Erie Railroad train carrying 833 Confederate prisoners and 128 Union guards to the prison camp at Elmira, N.Y., collided with a coal train between Shohola and Lackawaxen. About 48 prisoners and 17 guards were killed. Survivors, both injured and uninjured, were brought to Shohola where they were generously cared for by residents of the village.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
On July 15, 1864, an Erie Railroad train carrying more than 800 Confederate prisoners and their Union guards toward the prison camp at Elmira, New York, collided head-on with a coal train on the single-track line near Shohola. Dozens of men on both sides were killed in one of the deadliest railroad disasters of the Civil War era. The dead and wounded, prisoner and guard alike, were carried into the little village, whose residents cared for them without regard to which uniform they wore.
Why it matters
The wreck is a stark reminder that the Civil War's toll reached far from the battlefield, and that ordinary civilians often answered catastrophe with plain human kindness.
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Related events
- · Shohola train wreck (1864)
Themes & tags
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