Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1881-12-15
FRIGHTFUL CALAMITY.
Burning of the Ring Eheater, i'm
vienna.

The burning of the Ring Theater, at Vienna,
and the loss of nearly 200 lives, is one of the
most appalling calamities of modern times.
The fire originated on the stage. The curtain
was still down at the time. The precise manner
in which il started is not known. Some of those
who were on the stage at the time, and who
escaped, say that the fire was caused by the
dropping of an oil-lamp among the scenery
o hers assert that the fire came up from the
englne-room, and was generated by the engine
below the stage, which was supplying the thea
ter with electric lights. However it was, when
the flames made their appearance they did so so
suddenly and were in such alarming proportions
as to throw the stage people into an instanta-
neous and thorough paulc. The stage had but
one exit to the street, and for this narrow place
of ogress the entire 200 rushed. The flames
We're between the curtain and tGis door, and
this fact was the cause which prevented any
one trying 20 escape 10 the body of tie house
No one on the stage was bold enough to face
tue flames IN that direction, and 80 the great
audience had no one to duly notify them Of tie
terrible danger from which most of them might
have escaped, had they been warned in time.
At the stage exit the actors got damned and
the door was literally plugged up with human
bodies, and 1t Is believed that most of the mum
Der We're burned TO death.
During all this time the flames were having
1t all their own way among the finder on the
stage. There was in the theaier an iron cur
tam, winch, when down. completely severed the
stage from the audience This iron curtain
was up, and III the panic on the stage was for
gotten or cut off from approach by the flames
When the tgo behind the drop became great
enough 10 be seen through the painted fabric by
the audience they naturally supposed IT the re-
snlt OF the stage experiment with a calcium to be
.AAt a nh, tia Lalla -
tentlon to 1t. The flames attacked the drop
curtain from all points simultaneously, and it
seemed to instantly disappear and the whole
auditorium was III thoughts time in the
complete grasp OF the fire, which spread like
one vast sheet of lightning in hurricane.
What followed is lndescribable. The people
became demented and fell upon one another
like wild beasts. Some few got into the mas
sages, but the hall was dark. Both gas and the
electric lights were cut OF. In the midst of all
this terror, the noise of a terrible explosion
showed that the gas tank had burst, and
this time the flames burst through the roof
and through most of the Windows and the en-
tire space between the walls OF the large build
ing was like vast furnace III white heat with
living human bodies Tor Goals.
The sight attracted the whole town to the scene.
and thoughtful people took thlLer clothes,
nope, ladders and axes. The great Turner's
tire brigade was soon at the theater and NJ
BY actual count 1t was ten minutes from the
time the fire had possession of the auditorium
before d single hte was saved by outside as
slstance, and during all this time The
people within tae furnace were either burning
up or tramplng one another to DEATH Men
and women, crazed with heat and demented
with the prospect before them, destroyed
themselves by leaPlng IRON the front seats Of
the galleries into the stethlng abyss below
UP to this time none escaped except the few
VINO got from the stage, the fewer who man
aged to stumble out through the darkened
passage~ways from the pit to the street, and
tie few who dropped from the WIZ lows OF
the first floor above the PIT into the street. The
turner's began at once hnockng In the walls
around the exits and dragging out the bodies
piled thereby In this way they manas ed to save
several lives, but the flames soon drove them
away from the walls. Tie sturdy fellows then
organized q blanket service and invited those
at the windows on the high first floor to jump.
Fifty persons answered the invitations and the
Turner's caught every one oil the entire fifty In
outstIetched Blankets and saved them without
injury There were no windows in the street
walls higher than this first floor, and it is hardly
matter Of doubt that every occupant OF the
galleries was burned to death.
When the iftleth person had been rescued by
the blanket service the whole building was
mass OF white fire, SO hot that no near approach
was possible. After that no human being got
outside the walls, and the assembled crowds,
vast III number were compelled to stand
around and witness the most appalling and
healt-rending scene of modern times Bodies
could be seen falling from the upper floors into
the white fire below--some still and limp, as if
lileless others in the widest movements of ag-
ony. Jne was seen as il plunged from the
highest part Of the house. 1t We that of O
man, and he fell headforemost, both arms
crushed under the face.
A Vienna dispatch of the 9th inst says
Researches show that the upper gallery must
have fallen into the pit, where the only remains
found are small fragments Of bones. Beyond
doubt 800 gallery tickets had been issued. Only
loo of these are known to have jumped from
windows and competent judges fear the loss
Of life will be found to be fully 700