The Sun.
London, England, 1863-08-24 00:00:00

BOILER EXPLOSION IN SUFFOLK.

On Friday afternoon Mr. C. C. Brooke, coroner
for the liberty of St. Etheldred, held an inquest at
Charsfield, near Wickham-market, Suffolk, on the
bodies of two men named Denny and License and a
boy named Battle, who had been killed on the pre-
ceding day by the explosion of the boiler of a port-
able agricultural engine. It appears that the engine
was at work upon the farm of Mr. Walter Burch,
of Campsea Ashe, and that it had been stopped for
the purpose of adjusting the driving band, which
came off soon after work had been resumed after
the men had taken their afternoon meal. The two
men and the boy, who were employed about the
engine, were killed on the spot, and Mr. Burch
himself was struck upon the head by a large piece
of iron, sustaining a scalp wound which reduced
him for several hours to a state of insensibility,
The contents of the fire-box were scattered in all
directions among the straw and wheat stacked
near the engine, and a barn, the thrashing machine,
and the entire produce of 18 acres of wheat were
destroyed. The engine was fitted with a multitu-
bular boiler, and the end next the fire-box was
blown out. The engine was at work about 12 yards
from the barn, and was turned round and hurled
against the thrashing machine, which stood next
the barn. The cylinder with the pistons was driven
40 yards into an adjoining meadow, and a heavy
piece of pipe, containing the throttle valve, was
projected 112 yards in the same direction. The fur-
nace door and the iron plate upon which it was
hung, weighing about 11 cwt., were blown quite
across the meadow through a fence into another
field, finally coming to rest at a distance of 188
yards from the scene of the explosion. The jury
having viewed the bodies, which, as usual in such
cases, presented a sickening spectacle, evidence was
adduced to the effect that License was the engine-
driver—that Denny, just before the explosion, was
taking off sacks from the thrashing-machine, and
that Battle had been _employed on the straw stack,
but just before the accident took place his master
called him down. All the men about the engine,
which had been working unusually fast during the
day, were sober. Mr. Barclay, solicitor, wt o ap
peared for Mr. Whitmore, the owner of the engine,
expressed the readiness of his client to affordevery
information respecting it. He could show that the
engine ht.d been well constructed, and that it was
in good repair ; at the same time, nothing could be
more satisfactory to Mllr. Whitmore than that an
engineer should be called in to examine the remains
of the boiler and state his opinion to the jury. It
was agreed that this course should be adopted.
Before an adjournment of the inquiry, however,
took place a witness named Stephen Ward was
called, who stated that he was at work earlier in
the week with the same engine at Mr. Mannall's.
License was then driving the engine, which ap-
peared to be in a defective state, as the governors,
which regulate the steam, did not work at all. The
witness made an observation to License as to this,
and asked him why the governors were not acting.
In reply, License said it was an old machine out of
repair. License leaves a widow and nine children,
and Denny was also a married man with a lamily
of three children.

BURNING OF A SERAGLIO.

(From the Levant Herald, August 12.)

A positive calamity has befalle❑ Stamboul. The
old palace of Selim,of Mustepha, and of Mahmoud,
next to the principal mosques, the most unique and
characteristic feature on the south side of the
Golden Horn—has been levelled by the flames. The
disaster which has thus deprived the Turkish capital
of one of its most striking and historically interest-
ing monuments, happened on Monday forenoon,
when about seven o'clock, the sudden bursting out
of a column of black smoke from the southern ex-
tremity of the building announced to nearly every
quarter of the city that the quaintly beautiful old
building, which had escaped the fiery vicissitudes
of a hundred years, had at length fallen a prey to
the common local fate. In less than ten minutes
from the first appearance of this fatal signal, the
crimson flames shot up from out the black spreading
mass, and, fanned by a strong north-west breeze,
spread rapidly over the building, which, being of
wood and dried already to a burning point by a
ten weeks' broiling sun, speedily ignited, wherever
a spark fell ; till, in little more than half a hour, the
whole pile was hopelessly and irretrievably i❑ a
blaze. The fire-guns above Scutari vainly boomed
out their summons of rescue to both sides of the
Bosphorus; which was repeated equally to no pur-
pose by the signal-flags of the Galata and Seras-
keriat towers, from Tophaneh to Eyoub, and
thence round to the Seven Towers; before the first
of the scores of wretched engines which hurried from
every quarter of the capital to the scene of the cala-
mity could even reach the Point, the old palace was
far beyond salvation by any local means. The Grand
Vizier, who happened to be at Dolma-baktche at the
time, was the first on the spot, having hurried across
in one of the palace caiques. He was speedily fol-
lowed by the whole of the other Ministers, nearly
all the general officers in garriso❑ in the capital,
and about 3,000 troops. A couple of strong boats'
crews from H.M.S. Weser, lying off Tophaneh, also
hastened to the scene and lent excellent help in the
efforts made to overcome the flames. It was re-
marked that neither the large Russian steamers nor
those belonging to the Messageries Imperiales—
both lying close by—made any show of offering
similar assistance. Their aid, however, would have
availed but little. Favoured, as we have said, by the
wind and tinder-like dryness of every pert of the
main and adjoining buildings, the fire defied all
efforts to check it. The usual remedy of pulling
down whole perches of building on either side of it
was in vain resorted to—the flames literally jumped
over each successive chasm thus made, and rolled
on in increased volume, enveloping and devouring
everything before them. Incredible as it may
read to those who know the distance, not
merely sparks but whole flakes of fire were
carried right over the brow of the hill which sepa-
rates the Point from St. Sophia, and falling in and
around the At-meidam, ignited more than one
house in the neighbourhood. The fire which spread
thus distantly was not long in reaching the beauti-
ful alleys of cypresses behind the palace, and as
these caught, one after another, the blazing current
was carried on in an almost unbroken wave to the
successive courts and buildings in the rear. In an
attempt to cut down these trees one of them fell
upon an unfortunate sergeant of infantry and killed
him on the spot. Happily this was, so far as we
have been able to ascertain, the only fatal accident
attending the disaster. Several small burns and
contusions are reported, but only this one life was,
we are officially assured, lost on the occasion. Of
the many narrow escapes that of the Grand Vizier
was one of the closest. Accompanied by a dozen
or so of soldiers his highness had penetrated into
the centre of the building, se here it was believed
some of the fair inmates yet remained. Whilst
searching for these, the flames literally surrounded
the room in which Fuad Pasha and his companions
were, and it was only by escaping through a win-
dow which opened on the Marmora that his high-
Less and the men with him effected their retreat
but a few minutes before the roof of the room they
had left fell in. By 3 p.m. the work of destruction
was complete. The fire indeed still raged at that
hour in the detached buildings in the rear end round
toward Tali Kiosk, but of the old palace on the Point
only the outer court walls and the chimney-stacks
remained. About an hour after the fire broke
out the Sultan himself proceeded to the scene, but
on the urgent advice of his Ministers, his Majesty
remained only a short time in the dangerous neigh-
bourhood, returning to Doltna-baktche, whence the
progress of the conflagration was nearly as visible
as from the perilous spot itself.
The site of the old building thus destroyed is one
of the most historic in Stamboul. In the earliest