Marshall County Republican. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1856-1878, 1873-01-16
A NEW YEAR HORROR.

Five bodies were found in the ruins of
the Center street fire yesterday. At 7:3O
a. m. Capt. Kennedy put seventy-fve
men to work. A few moments later
they dug up the remains of a human
foot, the bones of hand held together
by shreds of muscles, and a pair of
thlck-soled women's CATERS burned to
crisp. These were carefully wrapped
up and taken TO the Franklin street po-
lice station. Their discovery seemed to
corroborate the theory that the intensity
of the fire had completely destroyed the
bodies. Two hours later Sergeant Jo-
seph Douglass unearthed the remains of
a human body. It was burned almost to
a crisp, had lost every vestige of the hui
man form, and was only recognizable by
the putrid smell which it emitted. At
that time probably two thousand persons
were In the immediate neighborhood of
the ruins. The majority were attracted
mainly by curiosity, but among the most
anxious appeared the relatives and friends
of the missing girls. AS soon as the an
nouncement was made that body had
been found, the crowd attempted to pen
citrate to the midst of the workmen, and
1t required the most strenuous exertions
of the police to keep them back. A
stretcher was procured, and the remains,
carefully covered with blanket, were
reverently carried to the station. It was
then ten minutes to 10 o'clock. Within
the two hours which followed, three
more bodies were found and carried to
the station, where they were visited by
crowds of people, who examined them
in the vain hope of being able to identify
q familiar feature of some recognizable
article of dress.
At noon the men ceased work for din
ner-al except Sergeant Douglass and
few police officers. They worked inces-
sanity until they discovered another body,
making five in all. The same stretcher
was used, the same blanket covered the
remains, and the same stir was created
when the march towards the police sta
ton was began BY this time the news
telegraphed all over the city by Capt
Kennedy, and as it become generally
known, an immense concourse of people
collected about the station and the ruins
of the fire. The scene in the mems
lodging room of the Franklin street po-
lice station was thrilling one Amid
the crowds who thronged that room and
gaZed with horror upon the ill-shaped
masses were the almost heart-broken
relatives of the dead girls, searching
among the remnants of charred clothing
which still adhered to the bodies for
some familiar garment by which the re-
mains might be identified sufficiently to
justify them in giving decent burial to
the ones they mourned. Suddenly the
air became rent with shrieks as an aged
woman threw herself on her knees at the
side of one of the bodies, and, making
the signs of the cross, prayed that God
might take her soul and join it with that
of her dead daughter.
81 know her, she cried, "by this cloth
sack. See this scapular, Gearing it from
the dead girls BOSOM, I put it on my
child's neck when she was baptized. I
have seen the vision of my darling girl
burning in the flames. Oh, Bridget,
what Christmas that was for you Oh,
God is this my New Years %
It was Mrs. McGrath, who had identi-
fed her daughter. She had to be re-
moved by main force, and for nearly an
hour afterward the poor woman raved
with anguish, until she was taken home
by her son, the devoted brother who had
spent seven days in the ruins searching
for his mothers's darling And what q
sad sight it was for that grief stricken
mother and brother to look upon those
remains Both thighs and arms were
completely burned away, one half the
skull was gone, the brains had become
baked and blackened by the fire, the skin
was wasted, and on many parts of the
body the calcined ribs protruded. And
yet the shapeless, almost headless trunk
was identified as all that remained of
Bridget McGrath, who, one short week
ago, was the life of happy little house
hold at 331 First avenue.
The heart-rending incident was soon
followed by another equally as mournful
Mrs. Donohue, accompanied by her Grip
pied son and a male friend, was fran
tically searching among the corpses for
her daughters, Margaret and Mary,
aged respectively Is and IA years, two
beautiful girls who had been their
mothers sole support ever since the
death of her husband, who fell from
scatfold two years ago and was almost
instantly killed. 81 want my children"
the almost insane mother cried. 81
know they are here. I made their
clothes and can tell them. Oh, God! let
me see them once that I may die to be
buried with them. Have / lived so long
to die childless? Must I now beg my
bread and cry over my children's graves?
Take pity, oh, Lord, on a poor widow
who mourns her children. Good Lord,
I'll die with them" and the poor woman
swooned away. When taken into the
open air she revived. Her only words
were: "Take me home that I may die. :"
The body Of Margaret Donohue, the
elder, had been roasted until it resem-
bled huge lump of charcoal Both
legs were burned off below the knee,
both hands had been broken of, but
still hung on by shreds of burned flesh,
which looked like leather thongs, the
skin was blackened, the extremities of
the bones were denuded of all flesh, and
the top OF the skull was gone. Neither
flesh nor hair was to be found. The
teeth, even, were blackened by the
smoke, the sockets left eyeless, the
mouth tongueless, and the face without
II?