Knoxville journal. [volume] (Knoxville, Iowa) 1874-1986, 1875-04-01

of ice, which seemed to be literally stalk
ing along like giant. The river COM
menced to rise rapidly where the party
stood, and they saw that unless they got
across the quarter of mile of low
ground at once their return to Port Jer-
Wis would be cut off. Buchanan, the
driver, instantly turned his Eorses, the
two others jumped in the sleigh, and the
horses started, under the whip, as fast
as they could run.
When the advancing food was first
seen by the three the river at Roses was
eight feet below the bank. BY the time
they got under way the ice had been
lifted up even with the top of the bank,
and was still rising rapidly and travelling
with great velocity. The race now be-
gan. The sleigh had not proceeded two
lengths before the ice commenced fill
ing the road in its rear with huge blocks
and was following the flying conveyance
with speed and noise that were fearful.
The driver piled the whip at every jump
of the horses, but, although they seemed
to fly, the two yards space between the
sleigh and the ice was not increased by
an inch. The horses were not many
seconds clearing the low ground, and,
when they struck the foot of the decliv-
ity leading up to the higher bank the
flood Of ice almost touched the sleigh,
and the occupants of the rear seat
crowded up in front, momentarily
expecting that some one of the
thousands of huge blocks rushing along
almost abreast of them would topple
over and crush them. They reached the
high bank, and, although the icy wave
rushed by them within three feet, they
felt that they had escaped the greatest
danger. Looking back over the road
they had passed, they were filled with
awe at the scene. Instead of the de-
pressed land, with narrow road cross
ing it, they saw the hollow had become a
mound Of ice. Cakes weighing hundreds
of tons lay piled up several feet where
the road had been, and were even thrown
clear across the road over the fence into
the fields. 1t was through that low,
gully-like piece of land that it was
thought the river would make it's way if
the ice-gorge did not give way when the
high water came. But for the fact that
the upper end of the gorge had worn
away almost to that point, there is no
doubt the flood would have been forced
through there, and much greater damage
would have followed than resulted from
the inundation of yesterday.
A few hundred feet west of the resi-
dence of Wade Buckley, which is the ex-
IRENE upper part of Germantown, the
river turns away from the road, and a
fiat of several acres reaches out to the
rivers edge. When the flood reached
the fiat the channel became blocked be-
low, and the whole mass became for a
time stationary. Presently, under the
great pressure of the body of ice above,
the food took another course; and COM
menced sweeping through low part of
the fiat, which would take it on the east
side of Buckley's house, and directly
across the road. 1t was necessary for
the parties in the sleigh to pass that spot
first. Again Buchanan piled the whip,
and his gallant team cleared the danger
Gus ground length ahead of the wave,
which swept across the road the next in
slant, and was soon carrying destruction
before it in Upper Germantown. Port
Jervis (Narch 1S) Cor. Neao York Times.