Rafferty, Jack 1838 - 1873

RAFFERTY

Posted By: Joy Moore (email)
Date: 5/12/2013 at 13:55:02

Iowa Plain Dealer August 8, 1873, P2 C3

The hero of a hundred fights is crowned with laurels, and his wealth heaped upon him by a grateful country, but in our opinion there is a higher heroism than that of leading bodies of men to slaughter. The patient nurse who risks the fever wards of a hospital, the medical men who enters into the jaws of death to seize its victim and bid him live, and the mute, inglorious hero, who at his humble post of duty, gived up his life to save, by his presence of mind, the lives of others unknown to him, and who look upon him, if they think about him at all, as merely a part of the machinery which draws them from point to point. Such a hero was Jack Rafferty. A week ago unknown beyond his humble companions his name unenrolled save on the pay lists of the company he served, today a hero, with a halo round his name bright as the corona which illuminates a saint. The man who forfeited his life in a simple act of duty, seeing no fame, no glory, no blazon in the deed, but still he died rather than forsake his brakes. He is dead, praise and blame are alike to him, but he has left a widow and three poor children unprovided for. The life insurance he was reported to have does not exist and the hearth which he kept bright is cold with the ashes of desolation, the hands he filled are held out for food Shall they want? Every better feeling of the public heart says No. American citizen do not give stones when asked for bread. Honors to his name are right, but bread to those he left behind is better. When he saw the impending catastrophe these little ones were present to his mind, and he might have jumped from his engine and saved his life. He died, and left to Iowa and the Union a sacred charge, a destitute family, Des Moines is already roused; let philanthropic men and women everywhere help on the subscription.—Davenport Democrat.

Iowa Plain Dealer August 1, 1873, P2 C4

Died at His Post

(From the Des Moines Register, July 22)
Last night when the fearful news came flashing along the wires that the passenger train had been ditched by robbers, the saddest line was that which chronicled the death of Jack Rafferty. “Shot dead in his engine” were the cruel words, and then a little later, the noble character of the man was revealed in the statement that he had seen the danger ahead and was about to apply the air brakes and save the lives of his passengers when he fell by the assassin’s bullet. True to the death, he heeded not the peril to himself but stood at his post and died there.

Not many Des Moines travelers but have known and esteemed him. Genial, hearty, brave and skillful, his presence in the cab was a prophesy of safety.

Jack Rafferty was about 35 years of age, and had been with the Rock Island Company five years. He leaves a wife and three children, to whom last night came the fearful midnight dispatch to tell of murder. God help them in the bitterness of their anguish. There remains to them but the memory that the husband and father died at his post—a hero in life, a martyr in death.