Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1861-04-25

| Ahe-EE'Bntiuk oceueb- ImmeDBo UontfuOtt0u
OF Property Eighteen Dead and Missing,
and between Thirty and. Forty Seriously
Burnt.
| TIDlouTE, Penn, Thursday, April 1S.
On the Buchanan Farm. Warren county,
Penn, seventeen miles from Tidoute, where a
large number of oil wells have been sunk,
within the past four months, with great success.
on Wednesday last occurred tne of the
most friQhtful accidents that it has ever been
the province Of newspaper to record. The
telegraph has furnished skeleton of the &C
cident, but the details have not yet been made
public.
well which bad been drilled over two hun
dred feet by Hawley & Merrick, bad struck oil,
but the yie'd being lees than expected, the
pumping was abandoned and drilling recon-
menced Over one hundred feet further were
drilled, when at half past FIVE on Wednesday
evening, sudden rush of oil through the FIVE
inch and half tubing threw out the drills and
gushed up 10 the air forty feet above the surface
Of the ground. At the least com outation, it was
throwing from seventy to one hundred barrels
an hour. Above this macs of oil, the ggas of
benzine rose in cloud, for fifty or sixty feet
As soon as the oil commenced gushing forth,
all the fires of engines in the neig gbborhood were
| seven, as large number Of men and boys we're
abound the well, engaged In saving the oil, the
gas from the we'll, which had spread In every di
rection, took fire, from the engine of o we'll
over four hundred rods distant, sWhen in SEQ
| ond the whole air was In fame, with crash
and roar like discharges from q park of ar
tillery. Z
AZ soon as the gas took FIRE, the head of the
jet OF oil was In furious blaze, and falling like
water from fountain over space one hundred
feet In diameter, each drop came down a blaz
Ing glIbe of boiling oil. Instantly the grouud
was fame, increased and augmented by the
falling oil. At oDce scene Of itdescribable
horror took place. Scores we're thrown fat, aud
Tor a distance Of twenty feet, and numbers hor-
ribly burned, rushing blazing from the hell Of
misfortune, shriekiDg and screaming in their an
guish, -, ~ -
Just within the circle of the fame could be
seen four bodies boiling In the seething oil, and
one man, who had been digging at ditch 70 con
vey away the loil to lover part of the ground,
was killed ss be dug, and could be seen, az he
fell over the handle Of the spade roasting In the
fierce element. Mr.. H. R. Rouse, Of the firm
ct Rouse, Mitchell g. Brown, of the village o,
Enterprise, Warren county, a gentleman largely
Interested In wells 10 this locality, and whose
Income from them amounted to ST. 900 u day,
was standing near the pit apd was blown twenty
feet by the explosion. He got up aud ran about
ten or fifteen feet further, aud was dragged out
BY Two men, and conveyed TO a shaDty some dis
tsnce from the we'll. When he arrived, not a
vestige Of clothing was left upon him except
bis stockings and boots. His hair was burned
OF. as we'll as his finger nails, hls ears aud his
eyelids, while the balls Of his eyes we're crisped
up to nothingness.
In THE couoitioO be lived nine hours made
his will, leaving $lO0 QUO TO the poor OF Warren
county; the same amount to repair the road, Of
Warren county--to be disbursed by the County
Commissioners, and $500 year to his father
his only living relslion-for life. He died,
however, without signing the will His body
was taken on Friday to Wes field, Chautau 10 ue
county, and buried, as he requested, by the side
Of his mother.
10 addition to Mr.. Rouse, the following we're
taken out of the q .mes dead
Two Messrs. Walker, brothers, OF Clarion
county, Penn. .s. r..s
Wesley Skinner. engineer Of Dobb's well,
from Wattburg, Pa. ~ ,i
A man named Stevens, from Cattaraugas
county, New York.
A Mr.. Judd Mason, residence unknown.
A boy named Albert Gardner, from Michi-
gan fA
The above were Recognised. In addition, there
are the skeletons of five others visible within
the circle of fame, and as many are missing,
strangers, who came TO witness the operations
OF the wells. Ills supposed that q number of
others have been burned to powder, close BY
the mouth Of the we'll fy.ti
Some thirty-iour we're wounded. 3sc
At the time Of the explosion, everything in the
neighborhood- or seventy rods --took fire,
- a. nka
were at once involved 10 flames. The boiler OF
Dobb's we'll, eighty rod, from the original FIRE,
blew up with tremendous explosion, killing
instantly the engineer, Wesley Skinner, adding
another inteDsity to the evenioR's horrors AZ
this time the whole air was on fire. The Jet OF
oil rushing up forty feet was almost Pillar Of
lisid fame, while the gas above II to the dis
tance OF hundred feet was aashing, exploding,
dasbing toward the heavens, and apparently
licking the clouds with its furious tongues Of
heat. All this time, during this tremendous
combustion, the sounds Of the explosions and
burnings were 60 tremendous and continuous,
| that they could be compared 20 nothing but the
rushing Of hurricane or tornado through o
forest. The heat OF the ERE WAS 30 Intense that
no one could approach within $50 feet without
| scorching their skin or garments. II was the
most frightful, and yet the graDdest pyrotech.
nioal display ever vouthsated to human be-
Ing, q gsse sss \ 81 ,.iot
| On Friday morning the oil was still rushing
up, on FIRE, with the same regularity and speed,
throwing, it was calculated, at least 100 barrels
an hour, covering an immense space with fam |
Ing OLA loss to the proprietors Of the we'll Of
from $20.O00 to $25. 900 daily. No human
power can extinguish the fames, aud the oil
must burn on until the well 10 exhausted. No
| nan can daacrihe ia fercent ne--no toprua de-
scribe the magnitude Of iss horrors, sas \
The following wells, with machinery, were
burned, with The accompanying estimated lOss