Witness pulled toddler to safety
Marine vet says he couldn’t save other crash victims
HATFIELD – When Nathaniel Jahn pulled up to the intersection of Highway 95 and County Road J, in Clark County, he could hardly believe what happened next.
The driver of a passenger van turned right into the path of a semitrailer truck hauling a tankerload of milk east on the highway.
The semitrailer driver swerved hard to try and avoid hitting the van, Jahn said, but only had a second to react. It wasn’t even long enough time to apply the brakes.
The truck slammed into the van. Nine people, including both drivers, were killed. Seven of the victims were members of an Amish community in Virginia, visiting family in Wisconsin.
Jahn rushed to the vehicles, and from under the wreckage of the truck he heard a whimper that turned into a cry.
It was a little boy, the only survivor of the horrific crash. He had been thrown from the van.
He pulled the boy out from the wreckage and got him to safety. The boy, Micah Schrock, was expected to be released from a Marshfield hospital to family members arriving from Virginia.
There was a young woman, barely alive, next to the boy.
Jahn tried to come back for her and any others he could rescue, but there was nothing else he could do. Police had arrived and kept him back. The wreckage was too much and the van burst into flames.
After serving two tours with the Marines in Iraq, Jahn, of Neillsville, said he never thought he would see anything like this at home.
It was supposed to be a normal, easy, Friday morning
“I think God put me there for a reason.”
Nathaniel Jahn
Witness to crash that killed nine people
as he was on his way to work as a land surveyor. “I think God put me there for a reason,” he said of being able to rescue the boy.
The crash was the second deadliest crash in Wisconsin history and the worst in Clark County’s history.
The Clark County Sheriff’s Office has not released the victims’ names, but an information line set up by the Amish community details names and ages of the eight victims in the van:
● James McCoy, around 45. He was the driver of the van from Pounding Mill, Virginia.
● Linda Byler, 44
● Lydia Byler, 24, Linda’s daughter
● Ellen Schrock, 23, also a daughter of Linda
● Orlah Schrock, 24, Ellen’s husband
● Judy Rose Schrock, 6 months old, Ellen and Orlah’s daughter
● Delilah Schrock, 21, Orlah’s sister
● Suzanna Hertzler, 18
The name of the truck driver has yet to be released.
The victims in the van were part of an Amish community from Burke’s Garden, a remote Appalachian region in Virginia. Burke’s Garden is in the southwest part of the state and is an unincorporated community with a population of about 300.
Nicknamed “God’s Thumbprint,” Burke’s Garden rests in a bowl-shaped valley at the top of a mountain. There are about 14 Amish families in Burke’s Garden, according to a “Lynchburg Living” magazine article in 2020.
“Even though they’re private and everything, they spread love all around the community,” Monte Hansford, a resident of Burke’s Garden, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “They’re well respected and loved because of the fact that they are a gentle, kind and loving people.”
It’s customary for Amish families to hire drivers for longer trips, as the religious group relies on horses and buggies for travel.
On Sunday afternoon, as Jahn and his family placed a cross at the accident scene, he was still badly shaken and mourning for the loss of the others.
A little earlier, a handful of Amish were also at the scene to pay their respects. Around the same time, eight small, modest, wooden crosses were placed there, a short distance from where others had placed flowers and another wooden cross. Written on it was, “Liddy, you will be missed. Your friends forever,”
Jahn hopes the crosses, besides showing compassion for the victims, are a reminder for people to be extra vigilant at that intersection.
“Maybe it will make people pay more attention,” he said, and maybe it will lead to some action in getting better visibility at the corner as well.
Marcie Parker of Black River Falls also stopped at the scene to pay her respects.
“There are no words you can say or even think of to describe how sad this is,” she said. “I know it’s tearing this community apart.”
“The Amish forgive people, but this is unreal,” she added.
Parker, 58, has lived in the area all her life. There are at least a few bad accidents on the highway every year, she said.
Heavily-loaded trucks coming over the top of hills can’t stop if someone pulls in front of them. She knows because her son is one of those truck drivers.
Karli Berg from Black River Falls drives this stretch of 95 nearly every day. The accident, she said, “makes me thankful when I get home safely.”
Hatfield, a tourist town, is known for its population of 5,000 in the summer and only around 50 in the winter. Amish families in the area run many small businesses including lumber mills, furniture making, greenhouses, and dairy farms.
They’re a valuable part of the community, said Lori Bixby, owner of the Deer View bar in Hatfield.
“They do a lot of work for people here,” she said.
Like everyone here Sunday, she echoed the same sentiment: “What happened was just horrible.”