Borki railway accident

Derailed in the railway accident in Borki on October 17th, ^July / October 29,  1888 ^greg. the court train of Emperor Alexander III pulled by two steam locomotives . near the Borki train station . 23 people accompanied by the imperial family died, nothing happened to the members of the imperial family, although the dining car in which they were staying at the time of the accident was badly damaged.

The two locomotives of the emperor's train at court

Starting position

The accident occurred on the Kursk – Kharkiv railway , which belonged to the Kursk – Kharkov – Azov railway . The accident site is located between Kharkov and Rostov north of the present breakpoint Spassow Skit near the station Borki (Birky) in the Kharkiv Oblast 43 km south of Kharkov. An approximately one kilometer long section with a slight gradient ended there. The route itself ran there on an approximately 10 meter high dam . The tracks had been renewed two years earlier.

The emperor and his family were in a court train on their way back from their vacation spot in Crimea to the Russian capital Saint Petersburg . The saloon cars were heavier than regular traffic vehicles . The train weighed just over 454 tons (excluding the locomotives) and was over 300 meters long. Contrary to the regulations, which at that time restricted passenger trains to 42 axles , the Hofzug had 64 axles. This was within the limits for freight trains , but the train was driven like an express train in terms of travel speed . That seemed harmless, as the train had been running without an accident for almost ten years. The train is said to have been traveling at around 70 km / h at the time of the accident. It consisted of two locomotives and 15 cars:

Side view of the accident site

• Freight locomotive
• Passenger locomotive
• Luggage and generator trolleys
• Support car for technical staff
• Transport Minister's saloon car
• Carriages for the gentlemen of the retinue
• Kitchen cart
• Buffet trolley
• Dining car
• Salon car for the princes and princesses
• Salon car of the imperial couple
• Tsarevich's saloon car
• Carriages for the ladies of the retinue
• Car for ministers
• Carriage for entourage
• Car for the military escort
• Baggage cart

the accident

The accident was caused by the fact that the double covering with two steam locomotives set the track at the scene of the accident vibrating , which is said to have led to the derailment . The two locomotives and the following baggage and generator wagons stopped near the track. Some of the cars two to eight fell down the embankment and were all badly damaged. The emperor's saloon car that followed (No. 9) also suffered severe damage. At the time of the accident, the imperial family was having breakfast in the dining car, the walls of which were dented and the roof of which was torn off. Nonetheless, none of the family members were seriously injured. The rear cars (no. 10 to 15) remained on the track.

consequences

Borki Cathedral

Church of the Redeemer, Foros

Immediate consequences

21 people were killed instantly, others were injured, two of whom later died from the injuries. The information on the injured varies between 12 and 36 people. All members of the imperial family were uninjured, although the dining car in which they were staying at the time of the accident was also significantly damaged.

Political use

Further facts about the accident are superimposed on the fact that, on the one hand, official state propaganda stylized the “miraculous rescue of the emperor and his family” into a divine judgment on the legitimation of the emperor's rule over Russia . Churches were built on this occasion , such as B. a cathedral in Borki and a chapel in front of the Dünaburg train station in Riga and a commemorative medal was minted. An icon created for the occasion was widely circulated as a reproduction. The episode that Emperor Alexander supported the roof of the dining car with his arms until all the occupants had left the car can also be expected in this environment . This version of the event was then rejected by post-revolutionary and parts of foreign historiography: The outer walls of the dining car were sturdy enough after the accident to support the roof.

The facts about the accident are also superimposed on the fact that on the other hand there were persistent rumors that the accident was caused by an assassination attempt . This was officially ruled out in the subsequent investigations.

examination

Commemorative medal for the rescue of the royal family in the railway accident

Immediately after the accident, Baron Kanut Scherwal , chief inspector of the Russian railways and responsible for the journeys of the court train, which had ridden on the train and broken a leg in the accident, instructed the railway director Sergei Witte (later Russian Prime Minister) and the director of the Polytechnic Kharkov Institute , Viktor Kirpichev , to investigate the accident. Anatoly Koni , a well-known lawyer from Saint Petersburg , later joined the investigative committee. Two weeks earlier, the Kaiser had criticized Sergei Witte with anti-Semitic remarks because he had insisted on reducing the maximum speeds on the railway line he managed . The investigative commission did not come to a uniform conclusion as to the causes of the accident - the members clearly represented partisan strategies and results in their results. Witte, as railway director, blamed the train's excessive speed for the accident - and put all the blame on the railroad company on the state officials responsible for the train's journey. Kirpichev, on the other hand, believed that rotten sleepers were the cause of the accident - and put all the blame on the railway company. Koni also tried to push all the blame away from the state officials and onto the railway company. Emperor Alexander eventually preferred not to bring the matter to a close, allowing Scherwal to retire, and appointing Witte as director of Russia's state railways. This suggests that the version on the causes of the accident was closer to Witte's suspicions than to those who wanted to put the blame on his railway company. Eventually, public opinion put some of the blame on the general contractor who had built the Kursk – Kharkov railway but who had died two months before the accident, Samuil Polyakov . He used inferior gravel , which did not adequately absorb the vibrations of trains running over it.

literature

• Sidney Harcave: Count Sergei Witte and the twilight of imperial Russia: a biography. ME Sharpe, 2004, ISBN 0-7656-1422-7 .
• Thomas C. Owen: Dilemmas of Russian capitalism: Fedor Chizhov and corporate enterprise in the railroad age. Harvard University Press, 2005, ISBN 0-674-01549-5 .
• Bernhard Püschel: Historical railway disasters. A chronicle of accidents from 1840 to 1926 . Freiburg 1977. ISBN 3-88255-838-5
• Sergei Witte: The memoirs of Count Witte. ME Sharpe, 1990, ISBN 0-87332-571-0 .
• Richard Wortman: Scenarios of power: myth and ceremony in Russian monarchy from Peter the Great to the abdication of Nicholas II. Princeton University Press, 2006, ISBN 0-691-12374-8 .

Web links

Commons : Borki train disaster  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Report on the accident Ukrainian

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Püschel, p. 62.
2. ↑ Püschel, p. 63.
3. ↑ Püschel, p. 62.
4. ↑ Witte, p. 95.
5. ↑ Püschel, p. 64.
6. ↑ Püschel, p. 62f.
7. ↑ Witte, p. 93.
8. ↑ Train transportation with two machines. (PDF 1.3 MB) In: Schweizerische Bauzeitung (SBZ), Volume 16, Issue 20 November 15, 1890, pp. 127–128 , accessed on May 3, 2015 . 
9. ↑ Püschel, p. 63.
10. ^ So: Püschel, p. 62.
11. ↑ Püschel, p. 64.
12. ^ Wortman, p. 311.
13. ↑ Harcave, p. 32; Sergei Kremlev: Россия и Германия: стравить! 2003, ISBN 5-17-017638-4 .
14. ↑ Witte, p. 93.
15. ^ Owen, p. 173.

Coordinates: 49 ° 41 ′ 15.3 "  N , 36 ° 7 ′ 41.5"  E