The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1889-06-08

| Harlan, w. AbrahamS, Capt. Skinner
Robert Stephenson, John Pusey, james
REYNOLDS, WIN. Mckinley, Geo. Vent
William Foster, Levi Johnson. Frank
| Boyd. J. Taylor and r. Overly.
THE TIMBER DRIFTS.
The magnitude of the destruction
created by the floods can be appreciated,
though not estimated, by the character OF
the matter that was floating on the Sus-
quehanua. The debris told with awful
realism the story of the storm, and the
place where that story was best studied
was high up over the yellow waters on the
Su$quehanna bridge of the Philadelphia,
Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad
Floating trestles, heavy with iron
had carried off railroad bridges like corks.
Drowned horses, pigs and cows. AID
chicken coops, corn cribs, sheds and
fence rails showed that farms had been do
vastated. Battered structures with shin
gled roofs rushing along caused the be-
holder to wonder what loss of life
in the wayside cabin. whose bedslead,
cradle aud chairs followed in the muddy
wake behind A new buggy was taken
out of the water at Havre de Grace. The
mass of swimming lumber was absolutely
impressive. The losses on the river
along by Columbia. Harrisburg, Sun
bury, Wiliamsport and Clarified must
amount to hundreds OF thousands of dol
lars in timber alone
The loss of lumber in 1865 is said to
have been 81, 900, 900 feet. 1t was esti-
mated that the value of the lumber pass
ing on Sunday under the bridge was 81 900
minute, or $50. 900 all hour.
Monster logs, iron zen - fnrty feet
long, many thousands Of which would
have cut boards two feet wide, were in
the current. Spruce, hickory, oak, ash,
poplar and pine were mingled indisrrim
inately. Esery unfinished product of
wood, from packages of fence paliDgs and
bundles of laths to mi!led boards and
squared timber, were scurrying to the
bay, avoiding the east bank and tearing
through the channel west of G lrrett Is
land, where the pack drew towards the
centre of the river and passed under the
middle caissons.
At the bridge abutments the logs and
lumber was piled in masses twenty feet
in high, and some of the heaviest logs
rested on top of these drifts. Once i'll a
while similar bunch that had become
dislodged from the B. and o. abutments
would come crashing into pier of the
P, w. and B. with ripping. crunching
sound, heavy boards would be spliptered
like match sticks. and the heap would
malicious roar, and passing beneath the
bridge swirled around, returning logs to
the piers that had already passed hun-
bred feet down stream.
Both the railroad bridges stood irwin
chile in the path OF the torrent, showing
no sign of damage to the piers.
Looking southwark for miles, rs far as
the eve could penetrate into the distance,
the BAY was thickly covered with the
floating wood, presenting an appearance
similar to that of the annual ice. gorge
season. From every point whence log
could be reached crowds of men and boys
stood with long boat-hooks. with which
wood aud brought them to a safe anchor
age. Near the banks On both sides of
the river men went out IN row boats, and,
the timber, they would attach
a stern line and tow it ashore. At the
middle of the bridge the long, hollow
boat shaped piers held men who were
lumber in piles ten feet high. Every
where the river looked as if nature, in a
fit of wanton prodigality, had rained
down hewn trees. 1t is quite certain that
the presence of the wood in the bay will
make it dangerous for travel for long
time, especially to side wheel steamers.
The steamer Colchester, which left Balti
more Sunday morning for Colchester
Beach, reports that large quantities of
floating logs, trees and stumps we're seen
in the bay. Several times the steamer
was compelled to run out of her course
to avoid coming in contact with the OBJ