Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1888-08-04
A House Burned Out From the
Heart of q Block
OCCUPIED BYt6OPERS0NS,
A Terrible Tale Of Suffering and
Death.
THIRTEEN BODIES In THg RUINS.
Six More So Horribly Burned That They
Will Dis-Many Others Severely In
iursi-Brave Efforts at Rescue
The Story Of the Holocaust

NEW YORK, August .3.-Thirteen peo-
pie were burned to death in a six-story
brick building in the rear of 1877 Bowery
this afternoon. Six more, burned SO bad
ly that they will probably die, were re-
moved to various hospitals. The house
was ram-shackls affair, hidden in the
middle of the block, the only entrance to
it being a narrow alley way from the
Bowery. In front of it was q four
story building, on the first floor of
which WAS q saloon called THE
White House." Adjoining this is Harry
Miners Peoples Theatre. In the rear Of
the burned building were two houses,
hemming it in on the Christie street side.
In this Gagged in building lived about $50
people. Each of the six floors WAS oecu-
pied by q single family, the head Of which
was a tailor who made clothing for the
cheap wholesale clothing houses, and en-
ployed from fifteen to twenty men, women
and children in addition to his
own family in making mp the clothing.
They were all Polish Jews, aud employers
and employed worked, ate and slept in the
crowded rooms OF the dingy tenement.
About 4:l5 O'Clock this afternoon, while
all the occupants of the room were busily
at work in the closing hours preceding their
Sabbath ewes flames broke out on the lower
floor. The ire had, when discovered,
already gained such headway that il was
in full possession of the stairway, and es-
cape by it seemed impossible.
BURNING ALIVE.
A stout German woman rushed franti
cally into the street, wringing ner hands
and screaming out, "Mein Gott, mein
Gott, does peoples are burning up"
This was q startling reminder that lives
were in peril, and great excitement en-
sued. The police reserve was called out,
and in short order 100 blue coats in charge
of Inspector Williams were on hand ready
TO assist the firemen. Alarm after alarm
was sent out for ambulsnces, and
in a very little while surgeons rolled mp
from st. Vincent, Chambers street, Belle
yue and New York Hospitals, while the
department of Charities and Corrections
sent two of their ambulances. Their GER
vices were badly needed. Many of
the frightened inmates rushed down
through the flames and escaped to the
narrow court yard with clothes sblaze,
and hands and bodies burned. Six Of them
were so severely burned that they were
taken to the hospitals and may die. There
were fire escapes on the font and rear OF
the house, but before any of the inmates
had tried to escape by them the flames had
assembled through the house and were
reaching from the windows, so that descent
by the fire escapes was impossible. One
man, alIesly half burned to death,
leaped from fifth-story window, and fell
a mangled mass Of flesh in the little court
yard. Others jumped from second story
windows and escaped with bruises. The
numerous crowds that had gpthered
shrank with dread as come wounded
shrieked and others groaned with the pain,
whilst others feebly moaned out in an
guish.
A MOTHERS DEVOTION.
Charles W. Norman, property man of the
theatre, with several of his comrades, ran
to the roof of the theatre carrying a small
ladder, which they stretched to window
of the burning building. A woman, with
her hair and clothing already ablaze, ap-
peared at the window, and Norman called
To her to cross over on the ladder. She
cried back that she could not leave her
two children. Norman tried to
cross over on the ladder, but the flames
drove him back, and he could not save
her. Afterwards the charred bodies OF the
mother and two children were found IN
the building. The men, however, ayalled
themselves of the ladder and escaped to
the roof of the theatre, When the firemen
had at last drowned the flames so that they
could enter the house they found on the
the third floor the burned bodies OF
man, woman and boy. On the fourth
Hoor they found FIVE bodies so badly
burned that it was impossible to tell
whether they were those of men or women.
On the fifth door no bodies were found,
but on the sixth five more bodies were
found, and they also were burned
40 that il could not be told
whether they were the bodies of men or
women. This made thirteen bodies found
in the building. That OF the man who
leaped from the fifth story window in
creased the death list To fourteen, while 1t
is feared that the death os some, If not all,
of those in the hospitals will make this
number greater.
THE NAMES OF THE DEAD
as far a. known srs:
Phillip Lalople, % years old, who jump
ed from the fifth floor.
Mrs. Adelia Gruft and her two children,
Joseph, Z years old, and Celia, years old.
The mother is the woman who refused to
escape because she would not desert her
children. Her husband escaped with an
infant child in his arms and was almost
crazy with grief at the loss Of
his wife and two other children.
The other bodies are at the morgus
awaiting Identification.
The fire started ON the first floor, in the
apartments of Emma Stevenson, the Jsni-
tress Of the building, and was caused oy
the explosion Of kerosene oil stove.
Two Disastrous storms.