American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1881-01-15
A FIRE HORROR.
Terrible Fate OF Ten Occupants of Tene-
menf-Iouse In New York Clty-Women
and Children Obliged to Leap from Lofty
Windows to the Pavement Below.


ment-House In New York CIty-Women
and Children Obliged to Leap from Lofty
Windows to the Pavement Below.
New YORK, January4.
AT SIS this morning Il fire broke out in the
tenement in the rear of James Doyle's liquor
store, IS Madison street. 1t started Mt the bot
tom of the stairs that furnished the only exit
for the tenants in the ffve-story building. ex-
cepting the fire-escape attached to the build
ing outside, and in less than five minutes
swept through the stairway to the roof, cut
ting of the escape of a score of persons. The
flames soon found vent also through the two
lower stories, and thus barred egress by the
fire-escape. The tenants, panic-stricken, made
rush for the roof, but the scuttle was firmly
hooked, and would not yield. Ascending, the
flames drove the people back within their
rooms. The widest confusion followed. Men
and women threw their children from the
windows and jumped after them through the
flames that swept across the yard and set their
clothing ablaze.
When the fremen obtained mastery, the
dead bodies of nine persons who had been
burned were taken out from the building.
Several were injured in their efforts to escape,
and were sent to the hospital.
The scene of the calamity is approached
through narrow alley GinrdIy wide enough to
allow the passage of portly man between
two tall tenemeuts, Nos b and 50 Madison
street. In front of the house No. IS is Doyle's
liquor store. Its back door opens directly
upon a narrow hallway in the rear of the tene-
ment where the fire obtained its start.
Plumbers were at work at the foot of the stairs
thawing out frozen water-pipcs, and for this
purpose used gasoline. The vessel was by
Some means upset, and, becoming ignited,
there was an explosion, which blew in the door
of the saloon.
In an instant black smoke rolled up the
long stairway, drawn onward by tho draught
by a m wi in bn fop
There was a momentary hush as the fright
ened plumbers hurried into the yard. man
sitting by the bar-room stove slammed the
hall door on the advancing fire. Immediately
there was a wild rush overhead, and the air
was filled with the walls of imprisoned men
and women, shrieks of frightened children,
and cries for help.
The bar-keeper and plumbers ran through
the street to the nearby police station. Very
soon the clang of fre-bells filled the street,
and the narrow alley became filled with fire
men and police struggling to bring help to the
imprisoned and burning tenants They came
too late. The FIRE, finding vent through the
ground floor of the house and through the
door, had seized upon the shutters, window
frames, and wooden floors of the balconies
outside, licking them up like much tissue
paper, and reaching upward toward the floors
where the frightened occupants were huddled
together.
Eight families occupied the house, two on
each ioor. From the second floor the Eagans
and Muldoons had ut the first alarm escaped
through the windows. Mrs. Mary Eagan
widow and her four grown children, Marga-
ret, Thomas, Joseph and John, reached the
ground in safety by quick jump. Mrs. Null
doom. who is over eighty years old, less
fortunate. Selling her two grandchildren,
Annie. aged ten years, and Kate, aged seven,
she sprang from the tire-cscape but in the fall
broke her leg. and crlwled away with diff
cuity.
On the third floor, Mr.. Regain, who lived
nsnne, escaped with his neighbors, the McKen-
ma family, likewise by jumping. James, aged
nine, Hugh aged four, and the baby, were
thrown from a window by Char.e, McKenna,
their eldest brother, lad of fifteen. The
mother was sweeping in the yard when the fire
broke out She rushed to the stairway, but
was met by Il solid sheet of flame, and realiz-
ing the danger of her children, reused them
by shouting, before they knew of their danger.
Jump, Charles; throw them down." the ago
nized mother cried, and stretched out her
arms to receive them as the three little heads
looked over the window sill beside their broth
or. The mother appealed to Charles to throw
the children to her and then to jump him
self. The boy quickly measured the dis
tance to the ground from his third-story
perch and taking the baby up first, tossed it
out, and it fell into the arms of its mother,
who caught the other children as they were
sent to her one by one. and finally broke the
fall of Charles as he leaped, and all escaped
unhurt.
on the fourth floor lived Cassidy and an
other family of Eayans. The Cassidy family,
unable to escape to the roof. flung themselves
from the window. Two of the children,
Charles and Thomas, aged six and eight years,
remained in the rooms and were burned to
death. The Easan family also leaped to the
yard, except a child, aged two years, that was
sufocated. Mary Eagan. in the fall, was badly
injured.
On the fifth and topmost story Mrs. Ellen
Sheridan at breakfast with her four chill
dren. At the first alarm she gathered to-
gether the children and sought to escape by
the stairs, but the fire had possession of them.
There was no succor from the street, and she
sought the scuttle in the roof, but it was i'm
movable She shrank back from the leap to
the yard. five stories below, and, closing tho
door of her apartment to keep out the rapidly
advancing flame, herself and children wero
suffocated by the smoke rapidly filling the
room.
A youth named Donegan, through an adjoin- |
ing house, had reached the roof of the burn
ing building. and with an AK, demolished the |
scuttle. Kate Sheridan, with child in her
arms, endeavored to escape. Her clothing
was abaze. As the girl nearly reached the top
she extended her arm to Donegan, who |
grasped it, but the flesh peeled from the bono, |
and the girl and child fell back into the flames |
pieces of the charred flesh remaining in the |
hands of Donegan.
Another victim of the fire was found this |
afternoon, making the total ten This addi- |
ton to the number is the babe of Mrs. Cas- |
sidy, which was discovered wrapped in |
blanket and chsped to the breast of its dead |
mother.
Timothy Harrington the plumber IS arrest |
ed. His hands are burned. He charges the |
whole disaster TO the carelessness of his boy.
helper named McGloan, who has disappeared. |
Their employer, Mr. Patten, has also been ar.
rested