Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1886-11-27
MAINE DIspATGHES.
ROTTEN FLOOR TIMBEIS.
Fatal Accident at the Warren Paper Mill
George Lewis Killed in a Peculiar
Manner.
PORTLAND. Nov. 26.

PORTLAND. Nov. 26.
at the Warren paper mills in Cumberland
Mill, yesterday morning, crex of seven
men were engaged in moving a heavy piece
OF machinery into one of the mills. The
machine they were handling is known to
paper makers as Jordan engine and weighs
about two tons They shoved it along into a
fioored passageway between the two large
twenty feet of the mill door, or nearly
abreast Of another heavy machine called
pulp screen that stood out of use in the pas
sageway against the right hand wall. The
combined weight of the two machines thus
brought together. proved more than the sup
ports could bear, and with a sound of break
ing timbers the floor began to give away be-
meath the workmen's feet. With the first
crack of warning, they ran for safety. Four
of them succeeded in getting clear off the
broken flooring, but the other three, George
Lewis, John Baker and Phillip Barney, went
down through with the broken floor and mill
machinery.
The break in the floor was about twenty
feet long and the width of the passage way,
about twenty feet the other way. The side
where the engine rested went down first The
fall was about twelve feet into space be-
tween the foundation walls of the mills with
running water along one side. Barney was
nearer the edge of the break than the other
men, and on the side which fell last He
was unhurt and crawled out of the ruins
without scratch.
John Baker stood beside the Jordan engine
when the floor gave away. He found him
self lying on his back in the bottom of the
pit, and looked up. He saw the pulp screen
great mass of iron ton or more in weight,
in position against the opposite wall still sup
ported in measure by the floor beams which
held by one end but tottering in the very act
of falling. He reasoned that the screen
would inevitably fall upon the spot where he
lay, and with all the strength Of his body,
rolled over and over among the stones into
the running water BY the further side and
| lay there hugged close sganst the wall. His
judgment saved his life for almost simuta-
neousy with his movement, the screen fell
crashing down and lay with one end overly
ing the Jordan engine in the very spot he
! had occupied only an instant before. He
escaped with a few slight cuts and bruises.
George Lewis also was beside the engine
when it fell, but on the opposite side from
Baker. Men who saw the occurrence say
that when the engine struck bottom in the
pit. Lewis fell on top of it, half his length
over, his arms and chest across one end Of it,
face downward. Then the pulp screen fell,
tremendous weight with crushing force. One
end struck among the stones of the bottom.
the other overlaid the engine. The body of
George Lewis was between these two great
masses; not directly where they touched, but
| in the angle that the uptilted screen made
with the round barrel of the engine beyond
the point of contract. Lewis did not move
after the screen fell
Men came running quickly to the edge of
the broken flooring and shouted down at
Lewis asking him if he was hurt. He did
not answer. Then men with ladders went
down after him. Some expected to find hlm
senseless with his chest crushed in, or at any
rate close pinioned between the two great
masses of iron, so that he could not stir.
But they found the only force that held him
screen had barely touched him; had not
crushed him the value of a pennyweight.
There was not bone broken, not bruise
upon his body, not so much rs a scratch
even. Yet the man was stone dead. The
doctors say he died of heart disease.
The cause of the floor giving away was
the rotting OF the timbers An inspection of
the broken ends makes it seem almost mar
vel that they cound have supported their own
weight. They are black with decay, hardly
a sound fibre remaining The timbers were
put IN, thoroughly sound at the time, about
seventeen years ago, and their rapid decay is
attributed to dampness from the water un-
dernesth
MIR. Lewis was one of the oldest employees
of the Warren paper mill. He owns the
house he lived in, about a mile from the mill.
He was soldier in the late war and mem
Der of the Grand Army. He leaves a widow
and four children. His age was about 45
years. 81,