The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1887-12-31 00:00:00

CALAMITIES OF THE YEAR.

The catalogue of the year's calamities, at home,
In foreign lends, and on the high seas, is a sad and
lengthy one. On the second day of .the year a haat
gas explosion occurred in barracks at Portsmouth,
killing five soldiers. A. false and appalingly disastrous
alarm of fire, crew ing a terrible panic, took place at
a Hebrew Drawls, ic Club in East Lo au on the
night of January the 18th, 17 persons, chietly women
and children being crushed to death, and
many more shockingly injured. On the
20th of the same month the British ship Kapunda
was sunk by a collision off the coast of Br Evil,soine 300
poor emigrants and sa;:ors finding a watery grave.
About the same time 100 Chinamen were drowned
from a transport which was run down by an English
steamer at the mouth of the harbour of Shanghai. An
awful railway catastrophe was reported from Vermont
on the sth of February, 50 persons being either
suffocated, crushed, or burnt to death. Then came
the series of tremendous earthquakes which wrought
such havoc in the Riviera during the last week in the
same month, wicking town after town, and village
after village, rendering thousands of families home-
less, and killing in all fully 1500 people. On the 18th
of February there was a colliery calamity in one of
the Rhondda Valley pits, bringing about the death of
39 miners. A more sadly fatal disaster of the same
description took place at Mons, in Belgium, on the
4th of the following month, 144 lives being lost;
while yet another pit accident was reported
from Bulli, in New South Wales, on the 23rd,
striking down 85 miners mortally at one blow.
A railway viaduct collaneed on the 13th of March near
to Boston, U.S., as a train was passing over it, and 40
persons were killed outright and 100 more maimed or
otherwise injured. During a great fog in the English
Channel on the 13th of April the steamer Victoria
lost her way, and ran on the shoals near to the
entranceto Dieppe Harbour ; shortly afterwards all who
had been on board were struggling for life in the waves,
and 15 persons met a disastrous death. Eighty lives
were lost in the Udston Col, iery accident near Glasgow
on the 28th of May; and three days previously, by the
burning of one of the Parisian theatres, the Opera
Comique, a panic of the wildest nature was created,
and in the stampede which followed many people
were knocked down and trodden to death, and many
mare who were unable to effect an escape were either
suffocated or fell victims to the devouring element.
The exact number of fatalities owing to this awful
event will never be known, as some of the remains
recovered from the ruins were reduced to cinder, and
doubtless not a few bodies were either entirely
consumed or converted into unidentifiable dust. The
corpses of over 60 of the victims were got out of the
wrecked house of pleasure, and publicly buried amid the
most painful scenes. In June extensive floods occurred
in Hungary, and there were some sad details to
hand from Upper Burmah of suffering effected
by famine. The most notable catastrophe chronicled
in July was an accident on the Grand Trunk Railway
of Canada, on the 13th of the month, in which 20
passengers met with a horrible death ky burning.
There were one or two fatalities, also, in con-
nection with the Naval Review at Shithead, and
the subsequent manceurres. In August the epidemic of
scarlet fever which lasted for months in London com-
menced, and so fiercely did the contagion rage at its
worst, that considerably over 2000 patients were day
after day under hospital treatment, and the accommo-
dation at the disposal of the saaitary authorities was
quite exhausted. On the evening of one fearfully hot
day in August, the 6th, a great conflagration occurred
on the premises of Mr. Whiteley, the " Universal Pro-
vider," of Bayswater, effecting damage to the extent
of £500,000 and causing three deaths. In the same
month intelligence reached England of an awful
railway accident iai Illinois, entailing a loss of 150
lives ; outbreaks of cholera at Malta and in
Northern India, the latter of terrible proportions; and
of extensive floods in Georgia. There was a
tremendous and fatal thunderstorm in the British
Isles on August the 17th; and on the 13th a collision
occurred in the Channel between a Greek vessel and
the steamer Norbition, seven lives being sacrificed.
Several persons were drowned by the upsetting of a
boat at Horeleydown Regatta on the 22nd; and four
days subsequently a yachting catastrophe occurred at
Ilfracombe, by which 12 persons lost their lives. Sad
as is the list of violent deaths in August, September'
did not contribute less to the sensational obituary
list. On the sth came the long-to-be-remembered
holocaust at Exeter, transcending its disastrous pre-
decessor in Paris for the destruction of human life it
occasioned. Over a hundred deaths resulted from
the panic caused by the alarm of fire, from the suffo-
cating fumes, and from the flameethemselves. Theold
Devonian city was hardly without a house of mourning,
and the painful feeling occasioned throughout the
country was intense. An excited mob set
fire to and wrecked the grand stands and re-
freshment rooms at lillie-bridge grounds on the
19th of September, and a railway official met with his
death during the disturbance. As an excursion train
was nearing Doncaster, in connection with the race
meeting on the 16th of the same month, it ran into
another, and 19 people were killed and 60 injured
through the collision. In a disastrous storm off the
South Coast on the 29th of October, a number of persons
lost their lives ; and onthe 19th of the month following
occurred one of the greatest calamities of the year,
the sinking of the emigrant ship W. A. Scholten in
sight of Dover, she having been in collision with
another vessel after a dense fog. That cold night
more than 100 of the passengers and crew perished
in the Channel. Some ef the bodies were recovered,
and the affecting scene at the public funeral at Dover
will long be remembered in the town and neighbour-
hood. A tremendous fire occurred at the winter
quarters of Barnum's "Greatest Show on Earth," at
Bridgeport in Connecticut on the 21st of November.
On the 3rd of December earthquake shocks were felt in
the Italian province of Calabria, and some 30 persons
fell victims to the disaster, while over 900 houses were
destroyed. A tremendous gale and snowstorm swept
over North Britain on the 9th, many fishermen of the
Orkney and Shetland Isles losing their lives, while on
the 12th 50 persons were drowned off the Greek
coast through a panic which occurred on shipboard.