The great railway washout of 1883

On Tuesday evening Mr. F. P. Allen arrived in this city from Spokane Falls, after having been en route several days. Mr. Allen, who had business to transact in this city, tried to make his homeward trip from Cheney via Colfax but soon found that impossible as the streams between those places were very much swollen, and on the day previous three of the Colfax and Cheney stage company's horses were drowned while trying to ford a small creek. Mr. Allen, accompanied by ten other passengers anxious like himself to get through, took their chances on a freight train bound for Sprague, where they arrived Sunday night. On Monday they left Sprague for Twin Wells on a construction train. From there they rode a few miles on a hand car, walked several miles on floating ties and through the mud until they reached the construction cut from this end of the line. Between Ainsworth and Spokane there is a gap of over sixty miles in extent which is more or less washed away. In a distance of four miles Mr. Allen counted no less than twenty-four washouts. The damage is so great that Assistant Manager Buckley does not think the track can be temporarily cribbed for ten days yet. It is claimed that there are over 100 washouts between Cheney and Ainsworth. Large forces of whites and Chinamen are engaged digging a ditch to drain off the waters. The extensive washouts were caused by the sudden melting of the snow which had fallen during the winter.