WARSAW, Poland (AP) — A 69-year-old Polish man has died less than a week after he was involved in a head-on car crash with eight-time world rally champion Sébastien Ogier, local police said Monday.
The man had been released from the hospital without major injuries following the accident and police spokeswoman Marta Domanska said an autopsy will be performed Tuesday to determine whether the death was linked to the crash.
Ogier had been preparing for a race in Poland when the crash happened June 25 near the village of Wlosty in northeastern Poland. The French rally driver and the Polish man were airlifted to a hospital while Ogier's co-driver Vincent Landais and the 67-year-old passenger from the other car were taken by ambulance. All four were complaining of back pain, but were conscious, authorities said.
Medical tests did not show any major injuries and all four were released home last week.
Domanska told Polish news agency PAP that the Polish man, whose name was not released, felt unwell at home during hot weather Sunday and an ambulance was called by his daughter.
“Because there was extremely hot weather on Sunday and some days have passed since the crash, we don't know if the two occurrences can be linked or not. An authopsy is expected to provide an answer,” Domanska said.
She said that experts were investigating the crash site. No one has been charged so far.
Ogier and Landais pulled out of the Rally Poland race, with their replacements Kalle Rovanpera and Jonne Halttunen winning the event that was held Thursday through Sunday in a rural area in Poland's northeast, not far from the border with Russia’s Kaliningrad exclave.
Ogier is one of the greatest rally drivers in history. He won six straight world titles from 2013-18. His most recent was in 2021.
Ogier has won 60 rallies, second all-time to countryman Sebastien Loeb’s 80.
Driving part-time in the world rally championship this year, he won the Croatia Rally in April and the Portugal Rally in May. Poland was hosting its first WRC event in seven years, and Ogier has won here twice.
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FILE - World Rally Champions Sébastien Ogier poses as he arrive at the FIA Prize Giving ceremony in Paris, France, on Dec. 16, 2021. The eight-time world rally champion Sébastien Ogier and his co-driver Vincent Landais have been hospitalised after beeing involved in a crash in Poland while preparing for this week’s World Rally Championship event there, Polish police and the Toyota team said Tuesday, June 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)
FILE - Sebastien Ogier of France steers his Toyota Yaris WRC car during the WRC Acropolis Rally at the stage of Aghii Theodori, west of Athens, on Sept. 10, 2021. The eight-time world rally champion Sébastien Ogier and his co-driver Vincent Landais have been hospitalised after beeing involved in a crash in Poland while preparing for this week’s World Rally Championship event there, Polish police and the Toyota team said Tuesday, June 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris)
Police officers are investigating the site of a crash between the white Toyota of eight-time world rally champion Sebastien Ogier and co-driver Vincent Landais, left, and a local resident's Ford, right, that collided head-on on a local road near the village of Wlosty, near Goldap in northeastern Poland, Tuesday, June 25, 2024, while the Ogier and Landais were on a reconnaissance run ahead of this week's Rally Poland. Ogier and the Ford's driver were airlifted to hospital while Landais and the Ford's female passenger were taken by ambulances. (Police Office in Goldap via AP Photo)
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden will award the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry on Wednesday to two Union soldiers who stole a locomotive deep in Confederate territory during the Civil War and drove it north for 87 miles (140 kilometers) as they destroyed railroad tracks and telegraph lines.
U.S. Army Pvts. Philip G. Shadrach and George D. Wilson were captured by Confederates and executed by hanging. Biden is recognizing their courage 162 years later with the country's highest military decoration.
The posthumous recognition comes as the legacy of the Civil War, which killed more than 600,000 Union and Confederate service members between 1861 and 1865, continues to shape U.S. politics in a contentious election year in which issues of race, constitutional rights and presidential power are at the forefront.
Biden, a Democrat, has said that the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol by supporters of Donald Trump was the greatest threat to democracy since the Civil War. Meanwhile, Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, riffed at a recent Pennsylvania rally about the Battle of Gettysburg and about the Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.
Theresa Chandler, the great-great-granddaughter of Wilson, recalled for The Associated Press how the Union soldier had the noose around his neck on the gallows and spoke his final words.
She said that Wilson essentially said that he was there to serve his country and had no ill feelings for the people of the South, but that he hoped for the abolition of the slavery and the nation to be united again.
“When I read that, I had chills,” Chandler said. “We can feel that as a family and that we’re enjoying our freedoms today, what he tried to move forward at the time.”
Brian Taylor, a great-great-great-nephew of Shadrach said this was an opportunity for his ancestor to be remembered as “a brave soldier who did what he thought was right.”
“I kind of feel that he was a bit adventurous, a bit of a free spirit,” Taylor said.
Shadrach and Wilson are being recognized for participating in what became known as the Great Locomotive Chase.
A Kentucky-born civilian spy and scout named James J. Andrews put together a group of volunteers, including Shadrach and Wilson, to degrade the railway and telegraph lines used by Confederates in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
On April 12, 1862, 22 of the men in what was later called Andrews' Raiders met up in Marietta, Georgia, and hijacked a train named The General. The group tore up tracks and sliced through telegraph wires while taking the train north.
Confederate troops chased them, initially on foot and later by train. The Confederate troops eventually caught the group. Andrews and seven others were executed, while the others either escaped or remained prisoners of war.
The first Medal of Honor ever bestowed went to Pvt. Jacob Parrott, who participated in the locomotive hijacking and was beaten while imprisoned by the Confederacy.
The government later recognized 18 other participants who took part in the raid with the honor, but Shadrach and Wilson were excluded. They were later authorized to receive the medal as part of the fiscal 2008 National Defense Authorization Act.
Shadrach, born on Sept. 15, 1840, in Pennsylvania, was 21 years old when he volunteered for the mission. He was orphaned at a young age and left home in 1861 to enlist in an Ohio infantry regiment after the start of the Civil War.
Wilson was born in 1830 in Belmont County, Ohio. He worked as a journeyman shoemaker before the war and enlisted in an Ohio-based volunteer infantry in 1861.
The Walt Disney Corp. made a 1956 movie about the hijacking titled “The Great Locomotive Chase,” starring Fess Parker and Jeffrey Hunter. The 1926 silent film “The General,” starring Buster Keaton, was also based on the historic event.
President Joe Biden speaks during a visit to the D.C. Emergency Operations Center, Tuesday, July 2, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
