Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-06-02
THE STORY NOT HALF TOLD,
A Probable Death List of Over Eight
Thousand.

1househus
SANG Hollow pa, June 1st-1 A. NJ
The first accounts sent out of the Johns
town disaster are far below the widest est
mates placed upon the extent Of the ca
lamity, and instead of 1900 o. 5000, it is
probable the
DEATH LIST WILL REACH EIGHT THOUSAND,
And many say 10000. 1t is now known
that two passenger trains, two sections OF
the day express on the Pennsylvania Rail-
road, have been thrown
INTO THE MADDEHED TORRENT
And passengers drowned. These trains
were held at Johnstown from Friday at Ii
A. II, and were laying on the siding be-
tween Johnstown and Conemaugh stations
An awful torrent came down narrow
defile between the mountains, distance OF
nine miles, and with
FALL OF THREE HUNDRED FEET
In that distance, sweeping away the
villages of South Fork, Mineral Point,
Woodvale and Conemaugh, ard leaving
but one building standing-a wooden mill
where, but an hour before, had stood hun
III Gus Vi DullulllSS, anu, udSullS Ol with
the
ROAR OF A CATARACT
And the speed of the wind upon the fair
city at the foothills. The plane in which
but yesterday sat Johnstown sits in the
mountains like
JEWEL IN A DIADEM.
The great Gautier Steel Works sat in this
plane and the city below it, the railroad
tracks bounding it at the base of the
mountains on the north. Here is where
the trains were standing when a tide OF
water
LIKE CATAPULT
Came down on them with such resistless
force that heavy trains, locomotives, and
all else were overturned and swept down
with the torrent and lodged against the
great stone viaduct along with forty one
locomotives from the Johnstown round
house. the machinery and ponderous
framework of the Gsu, sill, and the
accumulated debris of
MORE THAN THOUSAND HOUSES,
Furniture, bridges, lumber, drift. and
human beings. The low arches of the
yiaduct choked up Immediately, and the
water rushed back over the entire level OF
the valley upon which the city stood, to q
Gates about 3S feet.
In the great sea thus formed thousands
of people were
STRUGGLING FOR LIFE.
The scene to day is one OF the most har-
rowing possible for the Imagination of man
to conceive Accumulated drift gorged up
at the viaduct to a hight of forty feet, and
then took fire from the upsetting of stoves
or lamps. Then were
STRONG MEN MADE SICK
At the sight, as the flames roared among
the dry timber of the floating houses, and
human bodies were soon pinioned among
the house-roofs, locomotives, iron beams
and the freight, passenger, Pullman and
baggage cars, the greedy flames licking with
haste their
DIET OF HUMAN FLESH.
The scene was horrible beyond descrip.
ton. Human beings, from infancy to
withered old age. were
BURNED BEFORE THE EYES
OF the behold srs, and no rescue from such
a fate was possible. Strong men turned
away with agL nized expressions, aud
women shrieked at the horror of the scene.
The
DEAD BODIES
Have been computed at not less than 5000,
and the number may even exceed this esti-
mate. This seems incredible, but until the
waters shall have abated and the work of
removing the dead from this tremendous
mass shall have been completed, it will be
impossible to tell how many lives have
been lost.
HEART-BRoKEN PARENT.
On boards stretched along the TONS of
pews were thirty bodies which had been