Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1873-09-06
OYER NIAGARA FALLS.
Details Of The Recent Dreadful Acct
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ua OVER NIAGARA FALLS. |
Details Of The Recent Dreadful Acct
dent.
The fate Of the three persons who |
were carried over the Falls q few days |
ago is thus told by a correspondent. |
1t seems that the victims were a |
Young fellow and his intended wife. a |
bright pretty girl, both from Detroit,
and the young lady's little brother
Before retiring on Thursday night the
young gentleman asked where ne
should apply for marriage license.
He was informed that he would have
to 60 to Welland, the county seat, IN
order to obtain one. He then made
arrangements for horse and buggy,
with which to ride over on the morrow.
Before noon he started, aceompani-
ed BY the young girl, whose little broth
was left behind. During the absence
of the lovers the landlord at intervals
chatted with the child.
AN ELoPEMENT.
- is that pretty lady your sister,"
asked Mr.. Plummerfelt.
( & Yes sir," said the boy.
: - " Where do you live when at home?
AT Toronto"
And where does the young gentle
man liver"
He lives in the States, sir; but he
used to live in Toronto. He lived
there little while"
And so he and yoursister are going
to be married?"
Yes sir"
This was on Friday, the 4th of July.
In the afternoon the lovers returned,
their faces radient, and went out row.
ing In Chippewa creek, which empties
into the river above the Falls, and
were behaving carelessly in their boat
when an old gentleman who was pass
ing over the bridge that spans the creek
little distance from IFS mouth, was
attracted by the laughter that came up
from the boat, and paused few mo-
ments, looking steadily in that dircc-
ton. Whether the young man at the
oars was at the moment too much en-
gagged in looking into the pretty face
directly In front of him or not it Is i'm
possible to say, but the gentleman re-
marked that he was very unskillful In
the management of the boat. i.
While the old gentleman was Jock
ing. the boat, foatIngwith the current,
though little impelled by the oars,
passed out into the Niagara. Now, at
this point, less than three miles from
the cataract, it is possible to row across
tie river Not only is possible, but, as
a matter of constant occurrence, it is
considered comparatively safe. But
in crossing from the American
side, leaving the pier near the Erie de-
pot, it is necessary to row up the river
as far as the end of Grass Island and
then to cross, still pulling diagonally
up the stream and bending to work for
dear life when in the dark looking wa
tiers, pointed out from the shore as the
channel of the current. On the other
hand, rowing from the Canada shore
you still pull long way up the stream
before you venture to diagonlize across.
Down below the mouth of Chippewa
Creek, some twenty rods away, there is
river fence" beyond which the cur
rent sets with fearful force towards the
rapids. The old man watched the boat
moving along in direction diagonally
down the stream and heading for out
side of the river fence" He tottered
bank and caught at the railing of the
bridge for support, his face deathly
pale, and he trembled like an aspen
leaf
As the water fence was passed and
the current was bearing them along
swiftly specks ffrOth dotted the wa
ter The girl looked from these be-
yond, and caught a glimpse of the
white foam and mist thrown now and
again high in the air along the crest of
the first rapids. She uttered cry and
pointed in the direction of the first
line of descent above Goat Island.
Her lover looked over his shoulder,
and an expression of horror must have
settled upon of his face. There was,
doubtless, none of the bright color in
the girls cheek that made her the ad-
miratiOn of the rustics in the village
she was leaving behind only a half
short hour before. Her frantic lover
grasped one ofthe oars with both hands
he thought to turn the boat in the mid
die of that current running like
mill race. He looked then, APP
parently, for the other Oar-looked in
the bottom of the boat and on every
side frantically. He had lost the oar
in the moment of his first appalling
horror
He had dropped one oar in the wa
ter and it was carried away in a second
beyond sight and beyond sound, down
in the depths of the foaming abyss of
the rapids now yawning beneath them.
The boat darted down the first crest
of rocks, the stern swinging about;
moment she was lost to view, and then
came swinging on. seeming to point
toward Ceder Island. Then she rose
on the point of great foam covered
rock and darted down bow foremost.
as though steered by invisible hands.
From the new tower the poor wretches
who had gone so gaily forth on the frail
cockleshell were seen clinging to each
other in the bottom of the boat. Then
Il cloud of mist and spray yelled the
whole from sight, and for an instant
only. Just under the arch of the rail
road over the cleft of the Horse Shoe
falls. the end of the bOatprOtrudedfr from
the foam and mist; another instant
for the space of the lightnings flash,
two black fragments of the breaking
boat were seen, and that was all The
waters hid all else, and have continued
to dide all, save few fragments Of the
boat. which were washed ashore be-
meath the cataract.
=. Slater accounts announce
the finding of the girls body some
three or four miles below the
Falls, with one of her legs and one
of her arms broken.
WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH CUR