Drowned when bus ran into Sampit River.
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The News and Courier, Wednesday, Aug 5, 1931.

20 BODIES FOUND,
THREE MISSING IN
SAMPIT TRAGEDY

Georgetown, August 4 - by James A. Best

Twenty bodies had been recovered late today as searchers probed the black 40-foot depth of the Sampit river with grappling hooks for the 23 victims of the drawbridge disaster.

Those recovered included Warren Newton, 52-year-old farmer, and his son, Olin, 20, and 17 negroes, members of the picnic party which was riding in Newton's school bus when it crashed through the barrier across the open bridge and plunged into the water beneath.

Only one person on the crowded bus escaped. He was Jerome Fraser, negro newsboy of Georgetown. All the others, from Georgetown and Andrews, were drowned.

The negroes had engaged Newton, who had a contract with Georgetown county to transport school children in winter, to take them to Riverside park, a beach resort near Charleston.

Although lights were hung on the bridge to indicate it was open to permit passage of a boat, Newton is believed to have failed to see it.

C. M. Richardson, bridge tender, said the bus approached at a speed of approximately 30 miles an hour and did not slow down after it crashed into the barrier. The drop from the bridge to the water is approximately 30 feet.

Richardson said, however, that other automobiles had failed to see the barrier and that it had been knocked open several times last night, one automobile barely failing to go into the water.

He said he had asked the state highway department several weeks ago to remedy this situation.

Magistrate H. H. Higgins, acting coroner, impanelled a jury today which found that Harold Drayton had died "from accidental drowning." He said the same verdict applied to the others.

Of those drowned, seven were women and four children.

The Fraser boy said he made his escape by smashing a window and swimming out. He had severe cuts on his arm, however.

Officers tonight continued to have the muddy water dragged with long ropes to which huge fish hooks were attached on cords, in the hope that the other bodies will be brought to the surface by tomorrow.

The party of negroes were travelling in five buses, returning from the Riverside Park.

Three buses traveling about fifteen minutes apart passed over the bridge before its tender opened the draw for the boat to pass. The fourth, travelling at about thirty miles an hour, came down the straight of way and dashed through the small protective gates and on into the river.

After hours of work a line was finally attached to the bus about 5 o'clock this morning, but when any attempts were made to lift it up, the bus broke loose. The line was then fastened around the front axle and the bus pulled to the surface.

Bodies of those drowned were swept from the bus when it was pulled up. One was caught on the front axle. Others were found by numerous searchers during the rest of the day, most within a few feet of the spot of the tragedy. However, that of one negro woman was found floating two and a half miles down stream.

Tearful sobs and comversaton in an almost unintelligible gullah dialect of the low country were heard from the bridge as the negroes recognized a brother or sister, father or mother, when bodies were brought to the surface with grappling lines.

Soon after daybreak large crowds, mostly negroes, began to gather at the bridge and by 9 o'clock Rural Policeman W. G. Wilson in charge of rescue work had to call on state highway patrolmen, federal prohibition agents, county officers and others to aid in handling traffic across the bridge.

Funeral arrangements had not been announced late today. Many of the victims carried small "Industrial" life insurance policies and probably will be buried by "burying societies."

The death list was given out tonight as follows:
W. L. Newton, 53, and his son, Olin, 20, white.
Melvin Jones, 32, and his wife, Thomasena, 30.
Claudia Kinloch, 29.
Harold Drayton, 22.
Herman Scott, 17.
Bessie Britton, 40, and her two children Elizabeth, 2, and Willie, 6.
Hallie Thompson, 22.
Adele McCoy, 50, and her two children Hazel, 18, and Alathair, 10.
Ruth Brown, 18.
Nellie George, 20.
Altherdia Robinson, 20.
Lucille Mouzon, 20.
Nathan Cooper, 18.
Frank Crieft, 24.
Roland Martin, 22.
Floyd Moyd, 23.
The bodies of all but Bessie and Elizabeth Britton, and Lucille Mouzon had been recovered tonight.

FRASER'S ESCAPE

Georgetown, Aug. 4.

Jerome Fraser, 18-year-old negro boy and the only person to escape from the escursion bus that carried 23 to their death when it crashed off an open drawbridge into the Sampit river near here last night, had to break the "death grip" of a negro woman trying to get out alive.

When the bus plunged 30 feet before striking the yellow river and settling in the mud on the bottom 36 feet below the surface, Fraser was in the middle of the crowded vehicle.

"I was sitting in the middle of the bus on the right side," he told an Associated Press reporter from his bedside here today. "When the bus landed on the bottom of the river in the mud and the water started rushing in all at once. I head my breath. A girl, Ruth Brown, had a death grip on my toe.

"Knowing she had hold of my left shoe, I loosened my shoe string and slipped out of my shoe. I cut my hand in some way. I know I came through the window. After coming out of the bus I tried to save my sister (Thomasena Jones). She was at the end of the bus by the door. but I couldn't get to her.

"I was about to loose my breath. I rose to the surface of the water and hollered for help. The bridge tender (C. E. Richardson) and his helper pulled me off the fender of the bridge. I was under the water several minutes. I caught the other bus and came home."

Jerome, small for his age, said he remembered little confusion in the bus following its disastrous plunge.