The Burlington weekly hawk-eye. [volume] (Burlington [Iowa]) 1860-1876, 1864-08-20

Every frame house in the town was lar.
RED by the concussion alone to the exSent
Of having its inside plastering knocked of
beside other damages by missiles, &e. -
Against the houses and other obstructiona
near the wharf, and even upon the hill,
hundreds, and perhaps thousands, Of bro.
ken, twisted, and splintered lnuskets, and
such debris lay In drifts, like straw drifted
py the wind, and all over the ground fol-
least quarter of mile from the scene
OF the explosion of the shell, solid shot,
grape, canister, musket and mimic balls,
pieces Of shells, nails, screws, bolts and
Doltheads, and fragments of almost every
thing wooden, iron and leaden you can
think OF, are strewn and drifted like hail
and chunks Of ice Immediately after q
dreadful hail storm.
One Of the Sanitary Commission clerks.
who has postal the edge of the water, two
hundred yards above where the explosion
GccIsfss & picked @ up iva wash, basin ,i1 full
pieces Of shell, that fell within q few feet
Of him. Up on the hill, two hundred yards
from the scene Of the explosion, noticed
one shattered musket, among many others
lying around, stuck muzzle deep into the
hard street to the depth Of more than foot,
and SO tight that it could not be pulled out
by any one man. This was near where the
twisted section of boat keel lay. Every
where are seen the rents, dents, deep abra-
sions and SCARED burrows Of the iron and
leaden storm. The thousandth part cam
not be told.
And now for the casua1ties. How many
were blown in atoms into the river, from
the Kendrick, never to be heard of, is not
known. Probably they will not exceed a
dozen or 80. The captain Of the Kendrick
IS safe, having been absent at the time Of
the explosion, on another boat. The other
boats entirely destroyed or sunk were the
Gen. Meade andt J. G. Campbell. Cap
tain L. Bailey, of the Meade, of Somerset
county, Nd, and his steward, VIM. Cole
man, (colored) of Washington City, all the
persons on board, are both safe, the former
somewhat bruised. OF the fate of the crew
of the Campbell have as yet heard MOTH
ing. The dead and wounded taken out of
the ruins of the wharf and warehouse will
be found in the appended list Of casualties.
So with the killed and wounded on the
railroad train. / only saw one man dead
on the train-Solomon Leonard, 179th New
York. Poor fellowl He was q GONZALES
cent just going to the front. Several others
the cars and otherwise. The unfortunates
of the Kendrick, mostly colored laborers,
1t is supposed, were not all blown into the
river. Hand and feet and scalps of cOlored
men were rained about the town. saw
several and heard of more.
One sight was particularly unpleasant.
Up in the most frequented part of the town
where the part Of the boat hulk lay, there
was an object like the entrails of beef roll
ed over in the dust. II was recognized as
human by hand and foot being attached.
l noticed one noble horse wounded as if by
a long Whitworth solid shot coming down
through its back. Oh, how pitably he
groaned and throed, when soldier put his
cruel death-dealing musket to his head
Other generous steeds shared the iron storm
and many . poor, patient mule was sadly
repaid for his long fidelity.
] don't know how many names OF killed
I shall be able to append. I saw twelve
collected ct one place on the hill, some iden-
titled and some not. Enough names will
be found, however, to make enough hearts
sick.