Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1888-02-11
Horrors of an Eastern Blizzard.

~ 49,
may, to some extent, account for the
prevailing mania on the part Of the
people in hat frigid locality to acquire
official position in the milder and more
equable climate Of the great territory:
During last week a powerful blizzard
swept we the state of New York and
the appalling results Of the storm are
slowly coming to public attention. This
is also the region of summer storms, cy-
clones passing over and through the
state every few hours and leaving desc
lation in the rear, The facts relative to
the 8; @l5 blizzard have peen suppressed
by til authorities, but our agent in that
region 81 desolation has unearthed a few
samples, which, we give:
A railroad train was passing from
S~trykerville to Stormville laden with
passengers. The blizzard struck it amid
ships and the locomotive began to labor.
The atmosphere was SO imprcgnated
with powdered particles Of CONCEALED
moisture hat the pilot was unable to
see land marks only a few feet distant
and soon the locomotive began to stray
away from its accustomed route and
mix itself up with snow drifts which
rolled mountain high. Above the
shrieking blast was heard the voice Of
the conductor commanding the passen-
gers to keep offthe platform and not put
their heads out the windows. Presently
the water in the locomotive boiler be-
gan to freeze, though the fire in the
furnace ragged with fierce but impotent
heat. The passengers removed their
outer garments-overcoats and sealskin
sacques and mittens and ear muffs-and
wrapped them around the boiler. All
was vain. The water kept on CONCEAL
ing, until finally a man in the audience
who had lived in Dakota went into the
postal car and got all the mail bags and
wrapped them carefully about the loco
motive boiler and tied them on with
strings. This speedily thawed the ice
in the boiler and the traiI reached port.
A baby in one of the cars was about to
die when it saw the Dakota man with
the mail bags and it then took fresh
courage and knew it was saved. Most
of the passengers on this train had their
toes and fingers frozen off, but all sur
vived, though the country is stlewn
with the corpses Of frozen cattle.
Thursday morning dawned bright and
balmy at Tomhannock, in Rensselaer,
county, New York. 1t was a seductive,
deceptive morning and the people gath
cred about the liberty pole in the public
square TO select one Of their number to
be appointed Judge of the first judicial
district of Dakota. The fatal blizzard of
that dire period came upon them like
the hand of God while ballotinr was IN
progress and breathed in the faces of
the assembled multitude. When the
neighbors shoyeled away the debris a
few days later the stiffened corpses of
100 constitution loving martyrs were
released from the frigid embrace of the
drift, and nineteen of them were i'm
mediately taken to the nearest railroad
station to be shown to an Indian agent
who was expected to pass that way. A
count of the ballots clutched by frozen
hands revealed a tie vote.
An express train put out of Pleasant
Plains, in Duchess county, against the
earnest official protest Of the coroner
who was much benumbed by sitting
upon the many stitis brought into the
county seat. This was the sixth and
most fearful day of the blizzard. In
rounding a curve the right hand axle of
the forward car encountered a cold wave
and was so badly frozen that immediate
amputation became necessary; This
disabled the train and the passengers
got out and seated themselves at the
base Of Il snow drift which lowered
siXty-four feet into the snow impregna-
ted atmosphere. They had just set fire
to the end of a tie and were lowering
over the genial blaze and trying to thaw
out h thermometer, when an object
slid rapidly down the slope of the drift
and landed in a sitting posture with
much vehemence upon the fire, putting
it out, and only a block of ice remained
to mark its site. One of the passengers
lighted a match and they gazed upon
the object. 1t proved to be a plethoric.
red faced human form and under each
arm it carried a dead and frozen baby.
Being questioned the human form said /:
u am Major Kinney, of Dako"-There
was a simultaneous shrek of despair
and the passengers fled in all directions
out into the bowling blizzard. All
persisted. Major Kenney passed on to
the next railroad station, where he
found Il correspondent of the Chicago
Tribune, to whom he related his fearful
experiences. The Tribune did moi print
the story, because it happened so far
away from Dakota, and it now becomes
the solemn duty of Dakota newspape
to first give it TO the world.
In a school house in New York city a
teacher and his entire school Of seven.