The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1882-09-09
Peculiarities of the Great Michigan
Fire.

A correspondent OF the freeman Jour
nal, who has lately gone over the territory
devastated by the great fire in the forests
of Michigan last fall, says his observations
are conclusive that phenomena aside from
the ordinary conditions of combustion were
developed. In the first place the fire Gre
ated at least two veritable storm eenters
which had the essential features of storms,
and especially the spiral winds. The evi-
dences are confrmatory of the belief that
this storm centre, after it became fully de-
veloped, consisted of heated body of air
or gas in state of combustion, which was
constantly fed by the smoke and vapor
driven to the centre by the whirling winds
and the gases generated in the combustion
of the pines and other resinous woods.
This body of air, or burning gas, if it may
be SO called, by its heat acquired an ascen-
sive force, but by the rapid forward motion
of the fire was sucked forward and devour-
ed, actually preceding the fire proper 1t
is evident that this body was of intense
heat, possibly as great as 4000 Fahr., at
which point oxygen and carbon unite.
That such body of luminous vapor exist
ed, detached from the fire, is asserted by
many who saw it from distance, and by
those who were under it, but who escaped
from the fact that it passed above their
places.
The idea is further sustained by the fact
that the fire jumped whole patches of in
famlnable slashings, and alighted beyond,
lifting and falling in its forward motion
like balloon touching the earth. Fences
in the centre of broad fields burst into a
blaze as if by explosion, and others nearer
the fire escaped. A man in fighting the
fire took off his trowsers, fearing they would
catch fire and burn him up, and left them
in a furrow in the middle of a field remote
from any combustible material. When he
went to get them he found them burned,
and six quarter dollars that were in the
pocket melted together A set of spoons
were served the same way at another place.
Mrs. Lock and FIVE children were burn
ed to ashes, nothing but their bones re-
naming in the middle of the road, one
hundred feet from any heavy timber.
Green timber was dried and burned, and
perhaps the most conclusive evidence was
the apparently spontaneous appearance of
fire in stumps and fences when no sparks
were falling These blazes appeared of
white light and indicated chemical union
of carbon and oxygen. Another general
feature is the fact that the fire appeared to
move forward in parallel lines Of varying
width, and that in these lines everything
was burned, and frequently to ashes. AT
the edge of the track fence would be
burned square off, just as though it had
been cut or sawed perpendicularly; house
would be taken and the barn left; wagon
and tanning mill were within five feet Of
each other, and the wagon was burned te
ashes and the tanning mill not charred. II
would be impossible, under ordinary cir
cumstances, to burn wagon without piline
combustible material over it, but of this
nothing but the iron was left.
Finally, the storm and fire disappeared
simultaneously; that is to say, the fire was
dependent upon the storm, or secondary te
it-that it was prevented from lingering il
the track or from burning sideways. In
from two to three hours the fire was prac
tically out where it had passed, indicating
that the prime cause of the rapid combus
ton was in the storm which had passed
and which passing, perhaps, carried in it
wake condition of atmosphere opposed t.
combustion. This hypothesis explains
pretty much all the phenomena except the
balls of fire, which exactly correspond witt
what is known as "ball lightning" but
which is form of electricity wholly dis
puted by some, but recognized by Profes
sor Loomis. .....
The statements of Ballentine and Ka
bocke are confrmatory of this ball light
ming idea, and contradictory of the idei
that these lights arose from the intens
heat, or they themselves could not hav
survived it. Other statements are to tn,
effect that this ball of fire fell on the grounc
and exploded, running in all directions
This is explained by some who were no
present, who say that it was but the resin
Gus cones of the pine ignited, carried b.
the wind, falling, scattering the burning
pitch about them; but it should be remem
bered that those people who saw this phe
nomenon are men who have lived ami
forest fires all their lives and have seen al
the ordinary phenomena, and are not of
class exactly visionary or imaginative. |
is fair to assume the possibility of electri
cal phenomena incidental to this fire storm
both from the fact that it was great com
motion in the elements and because it dii
fered from a storm only in the facts of tn
absence of rain and presence of fire.