Canadian Pacific's railway station on N. Railway Street in Medicine Hat.--NEWS PHOTO KENDALL KING
kking@medicinehatnews.com
Medicine Hat existed long before it was known by that name. Many feet have walked its land. Many bones are buried in its soil.
There are countless stories about the lives which were lived here. Some are remembered fondly, some forgotten. A special few exist somewhere between fact and legend. One such tale has been passed down for more than 100 years; the tale of Medicine Hat’s phantom train.
It was late one night in the summer of 1908. Gus Day, a stoker, as locomotive firemen were known at the time, had just departed from Medicine Hat’s Railway Station in a train headed to Dunmore. He was joined by Robert “Bob” Twohey, an engineer.
The men weren’t too far from the city when Twohey first saw the light of an oncoming train appear before him. The light was approaching quickly and Day scrambled to pull the brake while Twohey stood motionless – made immobile by shock and fear of the imminent crash.
Both trains were moving too fast to stop and Day and Twohey knew upon collision there would be little hope for survival.
At the last second, the other train veered to the right and passed by with inches to spare. Day and Twohey stared in shock as the lights of the other train whizzed past then disappeared. They both ran to the window trying to catch sight of the other train as it sped away, but saw nothing behind them except empty tracks on the single rail line.
What they had seen didn’t make sense. Where had the train come from? Where did it go? How did it pass them when there was no track there?
Neither man said much for the rest of the journey, both lost in their own thoughts and suffocated by a lingering eerie feel.
Twohey tried to return to work but was too rattled by the unexplained encounter that night. He took a leave and chose to depart from Medicine Hat for a while. Day, on the other hand, continued working.
Several weeks passed with no incident, and Day was beginning to doubt what he had seen. But then it happened again.
This time Day was joined by an engineer named Nicholson. Like before, the light of an oncoming train appeared ahead of them, seemingly out of nowhere. Nicholson lunged for the brake as, this time, Day couldn’t move. Was what he was seeing real?
Again, the other train swerved to the side at the last moment and disappeared. There was no explanation.
It was the final straw for Day. When the train pulled into the station that night he asked to be reassigned to yard duty.
All was peaceful for a long time after. No longer riding the trains, Day felt a comfort he hadn’t known since he first saw the phantom train, Twohey, after some time off, returned to work, and Nicholson shrugged the whole thing off.
All was peaceful, until one day a yardman ran toward Day shouting, “There’s been a crash! On the line to Dunmore, there’s been a crash! They’re saying two of our engineers were killed,” the man said.
A sense of dread overcame Day as he asked, “Which engineers?”
“Twohey and Nicholson. They say another train was on the line. They crashed head-on.”
