The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1881-09-22


account of their perilous adventure.
t A poor woman in one neigborhood endeay
ored to save herself and children by digging
hole and covering as best she could with he
hands. They were all subsequently, foun
dead The little ones had their heads burne,
off to the shoulders.
! Monday morning man had occasion to Wis
1t some of the districts which were afterward
devastated by the devouring element TIL
country was busily engaged in preparing TO-
fall crops and al, indicated prosperity and in
dependence. Cattle were feeding in the pas
lures upon the roadsides. Forty eight hour
later all WAS changed. Homes were desolated
Green pastures were blackened by the breatl
of the destroyer. The carcasses of the cattl,
strewed the roadside. Farm houses and BARN
were smouldering embers, their occupants, il
many cases, who the day before breathed tn,
breath of lite and hope, were blackeneC
corpses. aaH Y
Among the most heroic actions was that O
John Oborski, of Paris Township. On seeing
the fire approaching he placed his sick wife anC
a child about two weeks old, together with his
four other children and three children of his
brothcr-in-law in a wagon, and hitching a
yoke of oxen to it attempted to draw it to an
opening about q mile and one-half distant
Before going many yards the oxen became
frightened ana broke away, leaYing the suffer
ing wife and eight children to be taken care oil
by one man. But Mr.. Oborski was equal to
the emergency. He took his wife with the in
FAINT on one arm, the youngest of the children
on the other, and instructing the remaining
seven to keep close to him, made dash for
life Burdened as he was, and having seven
little followers to watch, he succeeded in reach
ing the open space for which they originally
started. The fire was so close that the entire
party were temporarily blinded. 1t is estima-
ted that the fire in Paris Township travelled at
a rate varying from ten to fifteen miles per
| hour.
/ ONE EXPERIENCE
in escaping will afford an idea of the terrors
| The wife was confined to her sick bed The
husband was tired with fighting fire. There
were several children. At moor, Monday, it
was evident that they must fly for their lives
1t suddenly grew dark, so dark that the man
had difficulty in getting the horses. By the
/ time he got them it was was so dark from the
smoke that he could not see to harness them.
| Besides, the smok blinded the eyes and OPP
pressed the lungs. He got the horses har-
| messed and at the wagon. Then he went into
the barn for neck yoke, and when he came
! out he could not find the wagon and team for
| a minute or two. He had to feel about for
them like blind man. Then he went into
the house and carried his wife out on her bed,
bed and all, and put her in the wagon. The
| children got in and a girl of 10 drove the team
off three miles in the darkness and binding
smoke, over bad road with trees falling and
| the horses perfectly frantic with terror. How
she did it she hardly knows. The man being
left behind to make a last effort to start his
cattle, escaped on foot. Before he left, the
barn and farm were literally covered with fly
ing cinders; the glass OF the windows broke
with the heat, the believing, moaning cattle
gathered together and staggered together and
staggered aimlessly about, and as he got into
the road, the buildings, fences, stacks-the
| whole place-burst into flames which made
an awful yellow glare in the smoke. With
all this the wind blew with frightful violence
and varying gusts. Sometimes the smoke set
tied down about him in dense darkness, SO
that he staggered from suffocation. Then the
smoke would rise before the gust of air, and
an awful blistering heat took the place OF the
smoke. The woods along the road took fire
behind, on each side and in front of him; but
he got through safely, happy to find that the
wagon with his family had successfully pre-
coded HIM.
A report was received at place called
Grindstone City that four men, with their
arms and legs burnt off, had managed to reach
a barn which had escaped destruction, six
miles from that place, and team was at once
dispatched to bring the sufferers in. In places
the soil is actually burned to depth of several
inches Acres and acres Of land have been di-
vested OF every living thing. clear down to the
very roots in the ground leaving the country
as a desert strewn with ashes. In many cases
one cannot tell by the looks the difference be-
tween a plowed tieldanG one which there was
dense woods. There are square miles of
land all ready fer the plow-cleared as thor
oughly as if years Of labor had been expended
upon them. And there are other square miles
where the pioneer can now make farm by
merely removing a few scattered chunks, not
wholly consumed and putting up fences.
These are scenes as described by an eye-wit-
ness
1.-THE wind commenced blowing from the
west at about II o'clock Monday morning and
rapidly gained in velocity as the smouldering
fires were famed into flames. By 1 o'clock
the wind had increased to hurricane, and,
accompanied with a horrible roaring, bore the
Unsuitable flames with the speed of racehorse
through the woods toward the doomed Village
of Bad Axe An hour later the people who
had been fighting the fires for twenty-four
hours were obliged to abandon everything and
flee for their lives. A large part of the inhab-
itants found a refuge in the court house. This
building was saved with the greatest difficulty. |
While the fires were raging around it the in
terror, which was packed with men, women
and children, was as hot as the mouth of a
blast furnace, and all were in imminent dan
ger of suffocation.
"The FIRST building in the village to take fire
was Charley Brason's stable. His house al
most Immediately followed and then the work
of the fierce destroyer was finished with all pos
sible dispatch and completeness. By o'clock
the smoking ruins were all that was left to
mark the business part of the town. The
court house and records, five stores and ten
houses are all that remain of the county seat
of Huron County. J. A. Morgans family and
myself escaped by lying on our backs in
green swale in o low piece of ground to the
east Of the village. His only salvation was
the high wind which blew most of the intense
heat and dense smoke over his head and left
an undercurrent of comparatively pure but |
hot air. barely sufficient to escape suffocation
AS it was his hair was snged by the scorch-
ing heat and his clothes badly burnt by the
falling sparks. No one who has never expe-
rienced them can frame any conception of the
horrors of forest fire, The premonitory
stiffness, the subsequent roaring a terror in
ITSELF the falling trees, the showers of sparks
and the angry tongues of flame, then the
dense black Clouds causing the darkness of
night, these with the sutfocating and binding
smoke form series of horrors that one never
cares to 60 through second time
The midnight scene on the beach at this
place would cause the hardest of us to shudder
with terror. Wild, haggard and alf-famished
women with their infants clinging to them
old and young men, all mingllng together de-
spair indeliby stamped on their faces, and
louder than words proclaiming their suffer-
ings. .ta. ...-.
Tho Txx1r, yTjre,;r;o,