Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1871-04-19
TERRIBLE INUNDATIONs In PERU.
Whole Towns FIooded--Imrnense De-
struction of Property.


Whole Towns FIooded--Immense De
struction of Property.
4 PAYTA, Peru, March 16.-For the las
two weeks it has rained heavier an,
longer in the north of Peru than it ha
ever been known to have done before
In the towns of Payta, San Jose, Pac
asmayo, San Pedro and Lambayeque, i
has done an immense amount of dam
age that will require hundreds of thou
sands of dollars to repair
[ have been at all the above town
/ with the exception of Lambayeque
during the last three days. As yol
well know the most part of the abov,
! towns are composed of fat-roofed
undiscovered houses, that only tn,
least shower of rain would destroy
but unfortunately they have not beer
exposed to slight showers only, bu
heavy and oft-repeated torrents of rail-
(such as they have sometimes IN Quay
aquil, where the houses are better pre-
pared for it), accompanied by thunder
and lightning The consequence was
the small mountain streams were al
once changed into large, rapid, anc
dangerous rivers, sweeping everything
before them on their way to the sea-
The rain falling heavily on mountains
and lowlands down to the coast, the
whole country west of the Andes be-
came inundated, running the crops
throwing down whole villages, an0
spreading desolation all around
At Payta the waters swept over the
cliffs (that have an elevation Of 21O feet
above the level of the sea- and carried
with it vast quantities of mud straight
through the town and into the sea.
The plaza was filed with water in some
places four feet deep. The custom
house and P. S. N. Co. S Office had two
feet of mud and water in them, and in
fact every house in the town on the
same level was full of water, and many
have fallen down altogether others,
the custom-house amongst them, have
damaged most of the merchandise
stored there In most of the streets
you could have passed In canoes, al
though the water was rushing rapidly
towards the sea. Had the rain con-
tinued much longer few houses would
have remained standing.
The other day [ saw two alligators
inside of the shipping in the salt water
bay of Payta. They had been carried
from their native mud in the River
Clira) by the force of the current dis
tance of twelve miles south.
Miles distant from the coast drift
wood, grass, &c, may be found in large
quantities, more than / have seen be-
fore; and off the rivers Tumbes, Chira,
Piura, Leche, and Xecetepeque, and
San Pedro, the whole coast is washed
by muddy water, which in some places
extends three miles from the coast.
Lambayeque, an inland town of be-
tween seven and nine thousand inhabi-
tants, is totally destroyed by the rains
and inundations yesterday March -.
All the balseroes or raft men left San
Jose for Lambayeque to assist in saw
ing life, as it is useless to try saving
property as the whole country has the
appearance of vast lake or part of the
sea. In the town the only buildings
left standing are the church, which is
full of water, and part of two OF three
houses, which were built on higher
level than the others were. There is
sand hill, called there, the Arcu,sl,
about quarter of mile from the
town. To this place all the people fed
when the town become inundated. They
are now surrounded by water deep and
rapid no shelter from the sun or rain;
nothing under foot but sand, and little,
if any food; and there they must re-
main until taken off by balsas, launches
or boats It is terrible to think of the
sufferings they are obliged to endure,
with nothing around them but misery,
ruin and desolation
. Mr.. W. V. Fry, her Britannia Majes-
ty's Vice-Consul at San Jose, is as
usual foremost among the foreigners in
assisting and doing all in his power to
take the people off to some secure
place. He has had balsas or RATS ia
ken to Lambayeque, and the crews of
them are working hard to save life. 1t
is impossible as yet to say the amount
of damage done, as the water is still
rushing madly from the mountains and
spreading devastation whereverit touch
es. Pacasmayo and other places have
all suffered severely, but none so much
as Lambayeque. Considerable dam
age has been done to the Eten and
Chiclavo Railroad, but how much no
one can say until the water falls.