Item Info

Item 1, left:  A bereavement poem about the North Pennsylvania Railroad train disaster, variously called "The Great Train Wreck of 1856", and "The Picnic Train Tragedy".  The accident occurred on the morning of July 17, 1856, between a "special excursion train" out of Kensington, overloaded with passengers for a church picnic, and another train, out of Gwynedd.  In a tragic combination of miscalculated timing and failed communication, the two trains collided while rounding a blind curve between the Fort Washinton Station and the now-closed Camp Hill Station, in Whitemarsh Township.  It resulted in more than 60 dead and over 100 injured. The conductor of the latter train survived, returned to Philadelphia, reported the accident, then committed suicide.  He was posthumously absolved by a coroner's jury. The Annie Lilly of the song title was a 16-year-old girl from the church group, who died in the train crash.  Bereavement poem (author unidentified), printed by Philadelphia publisher J. H. Johnson,11.5 x 21 cm, 1856.

Item 2, right:  Slip ballad (an early form of printed song lyrics), recounting the "Philadelphia Nativist-Catholic Riots", (also called, among other names, the "Bible Riots") of May 1844.  The lyrics are sung to the tune of an earlier song, "It 'ill neber do to gib it up", composed in a racist vernacular by minstrel show founder Daniel Emmet, of Ohio.  The lyrics of the song in the present image are penned in imitation of the prior song's minstrel origins.  And although the riots referred to were not instigated by African-Americans at all, the lyrics neveretheless repeatedly reinforce vulgar racist sentiments. 

The riots themselves were provoked by the "nativists"--i.e., those who ironically saw themselves as the indigenous, or native-born, residents of Philadelphia--against the Irish Catholic immigrants.   On May 3, 1844, nativist groups held a rally in the Irish section of then-suburban Kensington, and the Catholic residents ran them out of the neighborhood.  The Protestants returned in greater numbers on May 6, fighting broke out, and the nativists were fired upon by the Catholics.  After the death of a few nativists, the violence continued into the next day, until the local state milita under General George Cadwalader intervened.  However, the nativists returned on May 8, the violence on both sides escalated, and the renewed rioting saw the burning or destruction of a few Irish homes, businesses and Catholic churches, before the riot was put down by the local militia once again.  After a period of quiet, rumors warned of a resumption of the riots.  Nativist mobs arrived on July 5, and over the next three days, periods of violence continued, with the burning or destruction of many more homes, businesses, and churches.  By July 8, both the local militia and the Pennsylvania militia (commanded by General Robert Patterson) succeeded in ending the fighting.  Slip ballad (author unidentified), printed by Philadelphia publisher J. Torr, 12.5 x 22 cm, July 1844.