Johnstown weekly Democrat. (Johnstown, Cambria County, Pa.) 1889-1916, 1889-07-26
TALMAGE VISITS us.
HE STOPS OVER AT THE STRICKEN CITY
INHIs WESTERN JOURNEY.

Burned and Christian Faith Still Album
dant-Money sHII Needed.
To the Editor of the New York World:
When first came here on Friday | was
impressed with the courage and pluck of
the survivors of the catastrophe. They
will, with the help of outsiders, rebuild
their city, and in five years it will be a
more prosperous place than it ever was.
They are an honest people and can get
any amount of commercial credit they
ask for. Many of the citizens temporarily
absent will return, and comfortable homes,
large storehouses and great factories will
stand where now are awful ruins. The
stories circulated about the Johnstown
people having lost their faith in God and
given up the Christian religion because of
this calamity denounce as false and
scoundrelly. The pastors tell me that
there was not one such case. On the con-
trary, there is more prayer and Christian
devotion than ever before. Even infidels
pray. One of them, the afternoon of the
disaster, in the upper room of a house
which was rapidly filling with water, was
overheard to pray: "Oh, God if you
can give me any aid at this time will be
very much obliged to you" All that
story published through The land about
the people of Johnstown in disgust burn
ing their Bibles is hemisphere false
hood.
The work that has been done here by their
own ministers and physicians and good
men and women, end without compen-
sation, should be spoken of everywhere.
In applauding outside workers we have
neglected to appreciate the Johnstown
Howards and Florence Nightingales, who
may be counted by the score, though
they saved nothing from the wreck ex-
cept the clothes on their persons. Let
all the people North, South, East and
West and on both sides of the sea un-
derstand that in their gifts to the flood
ed districts they did not do too much or
give too quickly. Not 5 per cent. of the
anguish has been told.
My heart is wrung with what |
saw on Friday. Can 1t be possible that
this is the beautiful and hosptable Johns
town that saw in other days? Where
once was street suggesting Euclid
avenue, Cleveland, is a long ridge of
sand strewn with broken planks and
twisted iron. At the moment when
great freshet which had been raging for
hours had begun to assuage wave from
twelve to twenty feet high rolls over the
already angry waters, and on that sur
mounting wave foated 800 houses.
twenty-eight locomotives from the round
houses and hundreds of people, many
dead, many dying, mass of helpless and
appalled, humanity. Two thousand dead
discovered and two thousand missing
makes me believe that the story of how
many thousand perished will never be
told until the resurrection trumpet shall
be sounded
10 show how accustomed to scenes of
death this district has become, on Fri
day. while human body was being taken
out of the ruins and | stood looking
aghast at the spectacle and the laborers,
no crowd gathered and workmen hund-
red feet away did not stop their work.
Such an avalanche of wretchedness
never slipped upon any American city,
Horrors piled on horrors, woe augment
ing woe, bankruptcy, orphanage, widow.
hood, childlessness, obliterated home
steads, gorged cemeteries and scenes so
excruciating-it is marvel that any one
could look upon them and escape in |
sanity No fear that sympathy for Johns
town be overdone The two and half |
million dollars contributed is small
amount compared with the thirty mil
lions by this flood demolished.
Was the work of devastation as great as
Lsupposed? Far worse. Types cannot
tell it. Only the eye can make revelation.
Bat the worst part of it cannot be seen.
The heart wreck caused by the sudden
departure of so many can be open only to
ono eye, and that the All.Seeing, Think
of one family of fourteen all dead except
one, and that the wife and mother, and
she the witness of their drowning! saw
the grave trench in which 260 were
buried and the whole graveyard like a
National cemetery, in which the unrecog-
nized dead have a particular number
placed above them and are recorded in
the undertaker's rooms with description
of the body and clothes. l can well un-
derstand how many of the survivors who
had buried their kindred before this dis.
aster occurred thanked God that they
were gone, saying; ooh, lam so glad
hat they escaped this"
Long after contributions of money have
ceased Johnstown will stand in need of
the sympathy of all nations Let those
who tonight have roofs over their heads
and their families around them, or the
bodies Of their departed in garlanded
sepulchres give at least one prayerful
thought TO the shattered homesteads of
Johnstown and those who know not
l hat 1pTfh Of nj, |