St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1872-03-01
Horace Whites Story of the Chicago
Fire


ing at this late day anything further of
the Chicago fire, is that the following
letter from one of the editors of the
Chicago TriLnnc- Horace White
Is such graphic description of this
great national calamity, that we desire
to record it in these columns
From the Cincinnati Commercial. October Isl
CHICAGO TRIRTNE OFFICE, Oct. If.
W. UdlStcdd. Esq. Cincinnati Commercial:
As il slight acknowledgement of vOur
thoughtful Kindness i'll forwarding to
us. without orders, il complete outfit of
type and cases, when you heard that we
had been burned out, ! send You a has
tily written sketch of what saw at the
great fire.
shall not he able to avoid the ap-
pcarancc of cgotism in this narrative,
but to attempt to tell what other people
saw would he to depart from the line of
fact and go into the domain of rumor.
The history of the great fire in Chicago,
which rises to the dignity of a national
event. cannot he written until each
witness. who makes any record what
ever, shall have told what he saw. No
body could see it all more than one
man could see the whole of the battle
of Gettysburg. 1t WAS too vast, too
swift. too full of smoke, too full of dan
ger. for anybody to see it all. NV ex-
pericnce derives its only public impor-
tance from the fact that what | did,
substantially, a hundred Thousand 9th
ers did OF attempted is, saved or
sought to save their lives and enough
of their wearing apparel to face the sky
in. As yOu have printed i'll your col
umns Il map of the burnt district, will
remark that my starting point was at
my residence, No. l3s Michigan avenue,
between Monroe and Adams streets.
What | SAW at the great fire embraces
nothing more heartrending than the de
struction of property. | saw no human
beings burned or sutfocatcd in flame or
smoke. though there were many. Nv
brother, early III the fray. stumbled
over the bodies of two dead men near
the corner of La Sale and Adams
streets. My wife saw the body of il
dead boy in our front ward as she was
taking leave of our home. How he got
there we know not. Probably the
corpse was brought there as to IL place
of safety. the hearers leaving it and for
getting it. or themselves getting stuck
fast i'll some ineXtlicablc throng of fugi-
tiVcS. ! saw no mothers with new born
babes hurried into the streets and car
ried miles through the night air by the
light of burning houses. have a friend
uhosc wife gave birth to Il child within
one hour of the time when the flames
of Sunday night Redeemed the sky. Her
home was III the north division. which
WAS swept clean of some ten thousand
houses. This suffering lady was taken
down stairs with her infant. and carried
one mile to a place of supposed safety.
She had not been there IN hour when
she WAS taken out Il second time and
carried mile and a half westward.
Blessed bc God that she still lives, and
that the Young child breathes sweetly
on her bosom.
| had retired to rest, though not to
sleep, when the great bell struck the
alarm. hut fires had been 50 frequent of
late and had been 50 speedily extin-
gui>hcd that did not deem it worth
while to get up and look ut it, or even
to count the strokes on the bell to learn
where il was. The bell paused for tif-
teen minutes before giving the general
alarm. which distinguishes great fire
from small one. When it sounded
the general alarm | rose and looked
out. There WAS Il great light to the
southwest of my residence, but no
greater than | had frequently seen in
that quarter. where vast piles of pine
lumber have been stored all the time |
have lived in Chicago, some eighteen
years. But it was not pine lumber that
WAS turning this time. Ii WAS ii row of
wooden tcmcmcntS i'll the south division
of the city, in which IL few days ago
were standing whole acres of the most
costly buildings that it hath entered
into the hearts of architects to conceive.
| watched the increasing light few
moments. Red tongues of light began
t" shoot upward. My family were all
aroused hN this time, and dressed my
self for the purpose of going to the
Tribune office to write something about
the catastrophe. Once out upon the
street the magnitude of the fire WAS
suddenly disclosed to me.
The dogs of hell We're on the house
tops of La Sale and Wells street, Just
south of ADAMS, bounding from one to
another. The fire was moving north
ward like ocean surf on IL sand beach.
1t had already travelled IN eighth of
mile. and was far beyond control. a
column of flame would shoot upward
, from IL tall building. catch the force of
the wind and strike the next one, which
in tulI would perform the same direful
office for its mcighhor. II was simply
indrScribahlc in its terrible grandeur.
Vice and crime had got the first scorch-
ing. The district where the fire got its
-
Chicago Fleeing before it was crowd
of blcar-cycd. drunken, and diseased
wrctchcS, male and female. half ObliVi-
ouS of the situation, half naked. ghastly
with painted checks, cursing and utter
ing rihald i"StS us they drittcd along.
went to the Tribune office, ascend
ed to the editorial rooms, took the only
/ intlammablc thing there, Il Kerosene
lamp. and carried it t" the basement,
where cmpticd the oil into the sewer.
. This Job WAS scarcely done when per
ceivcd the flames breaking out of the
roof of the court house, the old nucleus
of which, i'll the center of the editiCc,
waS not constructed of iirc-proof mate
rial. as the new wings had been. AS
/ the flames had lcapcd vacant space
of fully two hundred feet to get tO this
roof it waS evident that most of the
business portion of the city must go
down. but did not reflect that the city
water works, with their four great
pumping engines, were in Il straight
line with the fire and wind. Nor did |
know then that this priceless machinery
WAS covered by Il wooden roof. The
flames were driving thither with demon
precision.
Billows of fire were rolling over the