Connecticut western news., 1882-11-15
THE HALIFAX HORROR.
AWFUL SCENES AT THE BURNING Of THE POOR ASYLUM. Thirty.one Lives LOst-PicrcinG Cries pi Hospital Patients While ROast-
 ing to Death.

Thirty-One Lives LOst-Pierclng Crtes VII
 Hospital Patients While KOnst-
 ing to Death.
 The origin of the fire which broke out in the bakehouse in the basement of the Poor Asylum at Halifax, N. s., Tuesday night, Is not known. Smoke from smoul- dering wood spread throughout the punio- ing, causing the utmost terror among the four or five hundred occupants of the dormitories and other portions of the ln- stitution As there was no immediate danger the officials of the asylum were Ill no haste to remove the inmates. An alarm was quickly sounded, and without 1 delay the reels were run out of the engine l houses, One or two firemen who hap. 1 pened to be in the vicinity and a few peo- | ple who lived in the neighborhoodr rushed to the building. They found smoke issuing from all the windows, but no | flames were to be seen. In the west wing old women and children were seen at the windows crying to be let out, and as they began to break the glass 1t was feared they would throw themselves out. A sturdy axman dashed at the door leading from this wing to the yard, and with few vigorous blows of his aX knocked 1t in. The stairways were crowded, and out came a procession of women with children ! Ill bS5SN, Nae1u1So feeble old men, who upon reaching the open air wildly ciaculated their thanks.
 Then it became known that those in the upper wards of that wing were almost helpless. The fircmen aud others who were among tho early arrivals hastened up stairs, and willing hands were soon getting the blind, the halt and the lame down the long, winding stairs. The work was necessarily Q slow one, but finally that wing was emptied. In the mean time the flames ill the basement, which the superintendent, the engineer and other officials were trying to keep under, spread to the base of tho long air shaft or elevator reaching to the top of the main building. The draught here swept the flames upward with tremendous force, and ill D few seconds the heaviest part of the confagration was in tho top of the
 main building.
 The story just under the caves in this
 building was used ,ts a hospital, and in
 it were about seventy patients, most of
 them perfectly helpless. The fire was
 now burning terc ly in the hospital, and
 above it the heat cracked the roof till the
 lead poured down in streams of brilliant
 ire and the slatcs flew in every direction
 in deadly showers, rendering any near
 approach to the building almost certain
 death. Notwithstanding this there were
 hundreds of persons outside who would
 willingly have entered the building if they could have found their way through the place. Indeed, several did go in, but without guidance could do nothing in
 that immense building, and had to return
 to the yards An attempt to raise lad
 ders to the windows was made, but the
 ladders were too short, and after fire man had been knocked down by falling bricks and it was seen that the ladders l even would be swept away in few mln- l utes, these attempts were stopped. I The fire burst through the roof, and
 the scene was one never to be forgotten. . Far above the roar of the flames and the cracking of the bursting slate were heard = the cries of tho wretched patients Ill the
 hospital who were roasting to death. n Most of them, as before stated, were e helpless and could not leave their beds, :, and were, perhaps, stihed by tho smoke ' before the cruel flames reached them,
 but others were seen to dash themselves l against the windows and cling to the l sashes till their strength was exhausted I or their hands were burned of and they | fell back into the scething caldron of ' flames. A woman was seen to drag her
 self to corner window and force her
 body half out till she could breathe the n cool air outside She remained in that
 position till her head was burned off. . It is known that there were about seven- '' ty patients in the hospital, and so far as
 could be ascertained only half a dozen
 were carried out before the flames cut off
 all further approach to the place. A
 medical man, who is in a position to
 know, estimates the loss of life to be not
 less than fifty, and these were all patients
 in the hospital The poor old people and It little children got out of the other parts g of the building, and were huddled together , in the barn some little distance away,
 and were there packed around with straw
 and blankets to keep them comfortable IS till morning. All efforts to save the
 building from total destruction were fruit Il less, as it was utterly beyond the power ,f of the firemen, with the meagre supply
 of water at their command, to extinguish ,, the fire.
 As day dawned the fire had exhausted 3, itself, and nothing but the bare walls % and turrets, standing in relief against the
 cold gray sky, remained to show where
 the fire had been few hours before. -r In the City Prison the news was heard h by the inmates and created the widest y excitement, as many, especially of the
 young women prisoners, had mothers re who were ending their days i'll the poor ,e house. They implorcd the governor and
 the matron to release them long enough
 to learn the fate of their parents. Per
 haps for the first time ill their hardened
 lives they felt the full sense of their cap
 tivity.
 The Commissioners have gone care + fully over the books and find that thirty ID one of those ill the hospital perished- N eight men and twenty-three women. eS The building was erected in 1868. Il es was owned by the Province and city in s, the proportion of two-thirds and one lg third respectively. It was taken posses. of sion of and the paupcrs were transferred 5n from the old Poorhouse on Spring Gar, ~ den road to the new premises about CT November 1, 1870. Tho removal of old ay people on that occasion resulted in the he death of many of them shortly afterward, or The building cost $SSi, ,0O0, and was in bo sured for SIC, ,000 in each of the follow n ing offices Halifax, Phoenix, Acadia st Lancashire and Queens, making tota nn of $50. .000. There was $5,O ,OoO insurance a in Halifax on the outhuldings, whicf l, were saved, but none on furniture anC - clothing, much of which was lost. Som,
 fragments of chnrrcd bodies were re 10 covered, but no extensive search ha' nd been or can with safety be made among as the ruins ill their present dangerous con
 dition.
 You mustn't touch the top of the baby