Train Car no. 4321

[Mdiicshhaeelr]

From Memphis Daily Appeal, April 13, 1878
'Mystery Unsolved
'Freddie Mann was discovered in the rear of train car no. 4321 on Saturday March 30. Left Alabama on March 26 for Memphis.
'She was found nude and dying on a bale of hay, just a fragment of a dress around her hips. She had a garrote around her neck, to which was tacked a tag.
'Mann was unconscious when found and blood spots stained her body.
'By nursing, she managed to be able to speak a few worlds but they were of a wild and indefinite nature, except that her name was Freddie Mann and she was 20 years of age.'

I've not been able to find any other information of Freddie Mann. A name which sounds as if could just as well be the one who left the young woman to die in the back of train car no. 4321.

 

[doublestop]

Additional info from the Huntsville Weekly Democrat, April 17, 1878:

She was "colored", as they said then.

The train departed from Calera, Alabama.

She had not eaten for 4 days and her face looked pinched.

From appearances, they thought she had been ravished and then placed in the train car after the cotton was loaded, with whoever put her there hoping, perhaps, that she would die before the train reached its destination.

About the garotte: "Around her neck, tied rather closely, was a stout piece of cord, to which was attached a tag. The cord was tied tightly enough to leave a deep impression around the neck."

She suffered a great deal.

She was apparently still living after all of this, and they sent her back to Calera for the case to be investigated.

"If the girl should recover her senses, (it) may be solved."

This case was kept a secret by the railroad and its employees for at least a week after she was found.