The Newtown bee., 1889-06-07
The Johnstown Horror.


 Friday, May 3l, 1889, will go down in history as one of the most dreadful days that this country has yet known, for, as In the twinkling of an eye, from 5000 to 10000 people were launched into eter- nifty at Johnstown, Penn., and vicinity !; their homes and the very sites on which they stood being also licked up by the same terrible flood. 1t was tempestu- Qus week the Union through, with snow, Frost and ice on Thursday, 30th, in Mich igan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa and Indi- ana, but-the damage by the cold, though serious, was as nothing to the destruct- ion wrought by the flood, following the long continued rain that fell from Vir- ginia to Canada. The James, Potomac, Susquehanna, Alleghany and smaller streams became raging torrents, doing millions of dollars damage and drowning many people, whose loss, however, Is eclipsed by the greater destruction at Johnstown. Those great western arter- les of travel, Baltimore and Ohio, Penn sylvania Central, Erie, with many small CT roads, were made impossible. The Potomac destroyed the Chesapeake and Ohio canal, on which nearly $40, ,000, 900 has been spent. Mayor Foreman says that the Susquehanna swept away $5,- 100000 worth of lumber at Williamsport, AE many lives and so much property and provisions that outside help has been sent for the homeless poor. Hundreds of oth- CT places suffered equally, but the storm destroyed rail, telegraph and telephOnic communication and, in the greater horror of Johnstown, their loss, suffering and distress is hardly thought of.
 Stricken Johnstown, town of 3O,0O0 people built about the immense Cambria l. employment making iron and steel rails for the railroads, lies on the west slope of the Alleghanies, q station of import ance on the line of the Pennsylvania Cen tral road, 7S miles southeast of Pittsburg and 39 miles southwest of Altoona. Hanging ominously above Johnstown, q dozen miles or SO back up in the noun tains on the South Fork, one of the Penn sylvania tributaries of the Ohio river, was huge reservoir, once 9 feeder of the Pennsylvania canal, but latterly a fishing preserve for wealthy Pittsburg sportsmen. It's waters were held in check by an immense earth dam 70 feet high, roughly faced with uncemented stone, which, seems, was weakened by freshets of a year ago and one man claims to have notified Johnstown's mayor q month ago of the danger from the dam and, all day Friday, some watched for news of it with dread. The heavy rain of IS hours poured such flood into the reservoir that the dam gave away about o'clock, last Friday afternoon and a body of water 20 or 30 feet high swept down the South fork into the Conemaugh river at Johnstown, where it damned up against a massive stone railroad bridge of the Pennsylvania Central line and, the houses catching fire, burned hundreds to death, ,-how many will never be known
 The reservoir ran dry in an hour, which shows how quickly the destruction was wrought. Four miles below the dam lay the town of South Fork, with 2000 inhab. itants. A few miles below was the town of Mineral Point. Of it's 500 inhabi tants, 90 per cent. lived on low land close to the river. Five miles further dowr was the town of Conemaugh, with 250( inhabitants. Woodvale, with populat- ion of 2000, lay mile below Conemaugt and one mile still further down was Johnstown and it's cluster of surround ing towns, Cambria City, Borrougt and Prospect, with a total popu lation of 30,000. On made ground, anC stretched along at the rivers edge, were the works of the Cambria Iron and Stee company, representing an investment oi S5,000,000. There were also many other large industrial establishments along tho banks of the river. The doomed inhabi tants had warning repeatedly on Friday of their danger and, when the burst came, word was at once telegraphed dowI stream and extra trains prepared for talk ing away Johnstown's people; but pre- vious warning had so often proved false that few took advantage of this. The wall of waters, terrible in it's might, al. lowed no chance to escape once it struck village. Everything was swept bare to bed rock in its path and the thousands of victims buried under the debris. Il was impossible, too, to escape from the horrible flood when it had anything il it's grasp. At Conemaugh, a round house with 27 engines and several hundred freight and passenger cars, was picked up like kindling wood and part of q traiI loaded with passengers carried away.
 The stone bridge at Johnstown acted like dam. Cars, engines and houses piled up here 30 or 40 feet high, 400 feet wide and back up stream far enough tC cover 25 acres. This dam flooded Johns town entirely with the water held il check, so that houses that stood at thu lower end of the town were carried by the whirlpool to the other end the place The horror of fire added to the awfu catastrophe of that black night anC screaming victims were burned to deatl DcIoIG lDc tNGS VI lIlCIAAS aihDiG bO SdNt them. The flames ragged amid the flooC for three days and destroyed the bodies of the living and the dead. The river thus damned up, ploughed channe 200 feet wide through what had beer Johnstown's Main street. The dead were buried under the wreck far down tn, stream. A man walking over a corr field that had been covered with the de bris at Ninevah accidentally kicked up 1 clump of earth and saw woman's deat face They found 13S bodies on an acrt of that field. In the first appalling crasl of the disaster, negroes, Hungarians anC other ghouls went about plundering tn, dead, but few summary deaths by Lynch law stopped it's being done openly
 The brighter side of the dreadful pic ture is the rapidity with which Human ity sprang to the relief of Distress Pittsburg pledged SI00, GOO at once, Phil adelpha as much more, President liar rison gave $500 himself, Connecticut Legislature $25, ,000, F. T. Barnum $100 followed by other generous Bridgeport CTS and Great Britain and Germany join ed the committee of relief. Adjutan General Hastings of Pennsylvania pro ceeded ut once to Johnstown, order wal restored, the dead buried as fast as pos sible. workmen set at work by the hun flred to search for bodies, the injured ant sick gathered by scores into improvised hospitals and treated by physicians wh' hastened thither, the idle set at worl or ordered away. It will be weeks be fore the loss of life and property can b known even approximately, but it is nov placed at from 5000 to 10000 lives ant from $25, ,000, 900 to $50, 0,000,000 in prop erty.
 BERKSHIRE
 Mrs Hawlcv has closed her house ant