Morning journal and courier., 1885-05-09
News by Telegraph FROM ALL QUARTERS. IA VAST SEA OF FIRE. The Chicago Lumber
 District AbIaze. RUSSIA MUST HAVE HERAT. The Czar Playing a Dou-
 bIe Game. COMMANDER KANE SET. RIGHT. ONE OF THE SHORT JURORS
 ARRESTED.
GREAT LUMBER YARDS ABLAzE.

GREAT LUMBER YARDS ABLAZEs
 A Vast Sea of Flame at Chicago
 The Whole Lumber District on
 Ffre-A Hard Battle For the Fire
 men and PoIfce-The Losses Placed
 at a Million and a Half.
 CHICAGO, May 8.-For more than eight hours to-day the entire fire department Of Chicago, two hundred of her police and 8 thousand of her citizens fought and strug- gled with one of the most stubborn confa- grations which the city has seen since the memorable fire of 1871. The scene was the immense lumber district on the southwestern outskirts, six miles from the City Hall and less than mile from the stock yards. Here, lying on either side of the Chicago river, is, or rather was, vast field of pine lumber skirting the river front, extending back for several blocks piled in stacks from forty to fifty feet in height and averaging forty thou sand feet to the stack. At half-past 12 to- day workman rushed into the offices of the Chicago Lumber company on the west side of the river and announced between gasps for breath that there was g fire in Alley No, 2S. An alarm was at once sounded, but ten minutes later when the first engines arrived on the spot half million feet of lumber were in flames A second and & third alarm were sounded and the entire force of the street cleaning department was ordered to the scene, but the infammable nature of the material had placed the fire beyond control. To make matters worse, scow which had been moored in the river took fire, broke her fastenings and was swept across the stream, |. Q L. 411o yards of G. W. Hinckley & Co, Bigelow Bros and Adams & Hastings. Twenty steamers stationed one behind the other on either bank poured copious streams of water upon the blazing lumber, but the water was SO impregnated with grease and oil from the factories above that it fed rather than quenched the flames. The wind was blow ing hurricane, the heat was terrible and the i'm nense volumes of black smoke blinded and suffocated the fremen and retarded their efforts The fire continued to spread in a southerly direction until it covered district of half moon shape about one-haf mile in length and quarter of mile deep at the center.
 All this territory was ablaze and as one pile after another collapsed and those in the rear took fire, throwing tongues of flame high in the air, the scene resembled vomiting volcano with a vast landscape of fire stretched out beneath The fremen headed for time by Mayor Harrison worked with might and main, but they were driven back yard by yard and in many cases so rapidly had the retreat to be made that engines and hose were left behind. Huge pieces of burning timber were carried by the wind distance of half mile to Hell stead street and lodged on the roofs of seve- ral frame houses, all of which were gutted. Scores of families, some mile distant, re- while many buried their valuables in the ground. At o'clock the fire is reported as nnder control Several firemen were pros trated by heat and injured by falling tim bers. +
 A partial list of the sufferers with losses roughly estimated are as tollows Chicago Lumber company, twenty-six million feet, $450, 900 to $500, ,000, insurance $300,0 ,000; Bigelow Bros, ten million feet, $160, 1000, insurance $125, ,000; Adams, Hastings & Co.,, eight million feet, $100,00 insurance $60,- 900; G. W. Hinckley & Co.,, blaming mills and lumber yard, S26, 900, insurance S12,- 900; five dwellings 1000, insured fully. Other estimates place the loss as high as $1 ,500, ,000. It is noteworthy that this is the first occasion on which the entire fire de partment has been called out since 1874. The Inman Companyss Sheds Burned. LONDON, May S.-The Inman Steamship company's sheds at Liverpool were burned this evening. The steamship City of Berlin, which was lying in the docks, was safely lowed out of danger