The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado Part 3

CRUEL NEED FOR AN ARK

Frank Brandon, vice-president of the Dayton, Lebanon and Cincinnati Railroad, succeeded during the night in getting communication for a short time from Dayton to Lebanon. He said that the situation was appalling and beyond all control.

"According to my advices, the situation beggars description," said Mr.

Brandon. "What the people need most of all is boats. The water is high in every street and a.s.sistance late this afternoon was simply out of the question. My superintendent at Dayton told me that at least sixty had perished and probably a great many more, at the same time a.s.suring me that unless something that closely approached a miracle happened the death list would run considerably higher. We are now rigging up several special trains and will make every effort possible to get into Dayton tonight."

It was on these scenes of indescribable horror that the shades of night closed down.

CHAPTER III

DAYTON'S MENACE OF FIRE AND FAMINE

FIRE BREAKS OUT--HUNDREDS IMPERILED BY FLAMES--THE CITY THREATENED--70,000 IMPRISONED BY THE WATER--"SEND US FOOD!"--PATTERSON CONTINUES RESCUE WORK--PHONE OPERATOR BELL A HERO--EXPERIENCES OF THE SUFFERERS--INSTANCES OF SELF-SACRIFICE--LOOTERS AT WORK.

Scarcely had the appalling horror of the flood impressed itself on the stricken people of Dayton before a new danger arose to strike terror to their hearts--fire that could not be fought because there was no way to reach it and because the usual means for fire-fighting were paralyzed.

FIRE BREAKS OUT

One fire started from the explosion of an oil tank containing hundreds of gallons which b.u.mped into a submerged building.

The fire started in a row of buildings on Third Street near Jefferson, right in the heart of the business section, and not far from the Algonquin Hotel, the Y. M. C. A., and other large buildings.

The report of the fire was sent out by Wire Chief Green, of the Bell Telephone Company, who said the fire was then within a block of the telephone exchange in which was located John A. Bell, who for more than twenty-four hours had kept the outside world informed as best he could of the catastrophe in Dayton.

A. J. Seattle, owner of the house in which the fire started after a gas explosion, was blown into the air and killed instantly.

Mrs. Shunk, a neighbor, was blown out of her home into the flood. After clinging to a telegraph pole for half an hour, she finally succ.u.mbed and was sucked under the waters.

The explosion blew a stable filled with hay into the middle of the flooded street and this carried the flames to the opposite side.

The next house to burn was Harry Lindsay's. Then Mary Kreidler's and then the home of Theodore C. Lindsay and other houses that had been carried away from their foundations floated into the flames and soon were on fire.

The floating fires burned without restraint and communicated flames to many other buildings where families awaited help.

The Beckel House was threatened and Jefferson Street was on fire on its east side from Third Street as far down as the Western Union office.

Refugees driven from their places where they had sought safety from the floods were leaping from roof to roof to escape the new terror. The fire was rapidly approaching the Home Telephone plant.

HUNDREDS IMPERILED BY FLAMES

Another fire which started from an explosion in the Meyers Ice Cream Company place, near Wyoming Street, spread and burned the block on South Park, a block from Wyoming.

Flames, starting at Vine and Main Streets, jumped Main Street and the houses on the other side were soon aflame. In the middle of the street were a few frame houses that had been washed from their foundations.

These were swirled about for a time, and, as though to aid in the pa.s.sing of the section by fire, they were cast into the path of the flames. Persons hurried from their roof tops, where they had been driven by the flood, to the roof tops of adjoining houses.

A fire that appeared to threaten the entire business section was confined to the block bounded by Second and Third Streets and Jefferson and St. Clair Streets. In the block were the Fourth National Bank, Lattiman Drug Company, Evans' Wholesale Drug Company and several commission houses. This fire subsided somewhat by evening.

Fire broke out in the buildings on Broad Street and many who had taken refuge in the upper floors were threatened with death in the smoke and flames.

Sixteen persons were housed in the Home Telephone Building with a block and tackle rigged as a means of egress if the fire pressed them.

GOVERNOR c.o.x AIDS

It was reported to Governor c.o.x that some had leaped from the buildings into the flood. The Governor received word via Springfield that 10,000 to 12,000 persons were in the burning buildings, fighting the fire by water lifted in buckets from the flood.

Governor c.o.x asked the a.s.sociated Press to notify its West Virginia correspondents to get in touch with natural gas companies supplying Dayton with gas and ask them to shut off the supply of gas in Dayton, as the gas was feeding the conflagration there.

Pleading that troops be sent to Dayton to relieve the flood sufferers, saying that their need was imperative, and that the town was at the mercy of looters and fires, George B. Smith, president of the chamber of commerce of Dayton, who escaped from the flooded city, wired Governor c.o.x from Arcanum.

Governor c.o.x, following the information that Dayton was on fire and that those who had sought refuge in the upper stories of buildings were in danger, determined at six o'clock to reach Dayton with troops and a.s.sistance.

THE CITY THREATENED

It was impossible to get within two miles of the fire, and from that distance it appeared that explosions, probably of drugs, made the fire seem of larger proportions than it was. It appeared to have about burned itself out, and it was not believed it would spread to other blocks.

It was impossible to ascertain, even approximately, the number of persons who might have been marooned in this section and who died after being trapped by flood and fire.

The flames at night cast a red weird glow over the flood-stricken city that added to the fears of thousands of refugees and marooned persons, and led to apprehension that there might have been many of the water's prisoners in the burned buildings.

Fire started anew at nine o'clock at night and burned fiercely.

The men, women and children marooned in the Beckel Hotel were terror stricken when fire threatened the building for the second time at night.

Since Tuesday morning two hundred and fifty persons had been in the place.

Crowded in the upper stories of tall office buildings and residences in Dayton, two miles each way from the center of the town, were hundreds of persons whom it was impossible to approach. Hundreds of fires which it was impossible to fight were burning. The rescue boats were unable to get farther from the sh.o.r.e than the throw line would permit. They could not live in the current.

At midnight residents of Dayton watching the course of the flames from across the wide stretch of flood waters believed the fire got its new start in the afternoon in the store of the Patterson Tool and Supply Company, on Third Street, just east of Jefferson, whence it ate its way west, apparently aided by escaping gas and exploding chemicals in two wholesale drug establishments.

Throughout the night fires lighted the sky and illuminated the rus.h.i.+ng waters. Fifty thousand people were jammed in the upper floors of their homes, with no gas, no drinking water, no light, no heat, no food.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y.

The flood at Watervliet, New York, showing buildings torn from their foundations and floating down the stream. Great damage and untold suffering resulted]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y.

Rescuer leaving one of the houses in the flooded district and removing a family to safety]

THE CREST OF THE FLOOD

The crest of the Dayton flood pa.s.sed about midnight, but the next few hours allowed no appreciable lowering in the water. Wednesday morning brought little hope of immediate relief to those who spent the night in horror, however, and it was feared that the number of drowned had been greatly increased during the twelve hours of darkness.