Omaha daily bee., 1889-07-07
OPENED The RIVER OF DEATH
How Swiss Valley Was Devas-
tated BY n Flood.
THEIR HERolsM ? WAS IN VAIN.
The sturdy Strokes ,cof the Brave
Mountainous Lured the Unsus-
pecting Villagers Into the Very
Pathway of tho Disaster.
A Fearful Alpine Flood.

the Tete Noir, in Southern SwitZer-
land, still bears, fearful traces OF the
most devastating flood recorded in local
history, concerning which heard
many a grim legend from the herdsmen
and woodcutters OF the district while
exploring the scene of the famous
tragedy, writes David Ker in the New
York Times. Strangely enough, this
great catastrophe was in all its chief
details an almost literal prophecy of
the Conemaugh disaster, with the addi-
tional interest of having been caused
by the bursting Of u natural dam, the
formation of which was well-nigh as
destructive as its collapse.
Early in that fatal summer the river
Dranse (Which runs down into the
Rhone through that steep, narrow,
rocky valley at the lower end of which
stands the town OF Martigny) suddenly
dried up so completely that not drop
Of water was leftin the deep, zig-zag
channel which had echoed with the roar
of leaping torrents only a few days be-
fore. The whole valley was IN dismay,
and many of the peasants fled from
their homes, remembering that SINH
lar phenomenon had Immediately pre-
ceded the three most terrific landslips
ever known in Switzerland. A few of
the bolder spirits, however, volunteered
to ascend the gorge and find out the
cause of this wierd prodigy, and they
discovered it only too soon.
A mighty mass of ice, upon which
good-sized village might have stood
with ease, had broken away from the
great glacier overhead and slipped
right down into the bed of the Dranse,
which it blocked 70 completely that not
a drop could pass. Behind this natural
dam the checked waters of the river
were forming kind of vast reservoir,
rising ever higher and higher, and en-
guling one by one the tiny upland
hamlets that clung to the slopes on
either side. Thus, by hideous gro
tesqueness of horror, men were being
drowned on mountain top while their
comrades in in the valley below were
TORTURED WITH THIRST.
Few men could have faced unmoved
the sight of this tremendous mass of
pent-up waters Sufficient to drown the
whole valley at one rush) hanging right
over their heads and threatening to
burst upon them at any moment. But
the dreadful crisis, which would have
utterly unstrung any weaker spirit,
only nerved these bold hearts to re-
doubled energy. 1t was at once de-
cided to cut a tunnel through the ice,
in order to let off the water ere it could
overflow. All the men who could be
collected were brought together in a
wonderfully short space of time, and
to work they went, hewing their way
through the ice barrier as manfully as
the brave fellows who are now toiling
amid the ruins OF Johnstown.
Seldom has more deperate task been
attempted: never has it been more he
roically carried out. The cutting of
the tunnel-begun from both ends at
once in order to save time-went on day
| and night for more than two weeks, the
gangs relieving each other every few
hours. During the whole of this time
the gallant men worked with death star
ing them in the face, for at any instant
the imprisoned waters that gurgled and
growled beneath their feet might break
loose and sweep them headlong to de-
struction. But not man wavered.
The ghostly darkness, the deadly chill
of the icy walls that shut them in, the
hollow roar, the unseen waters beneath,
the crashing and spllntering of the
huge blocks of ice that kept
falling around them on every
side, the trembling and groaning
of the whole mass as the flood pressed
upon it harder and harder, the ever
present and hourly-deepening shadow
of sudden and horrible death might
we'll have appalled, the stoutest heart.
But, even when the pickaxes actually
dropped from their benumbed fingers,
the little band of heroes
NEVER FLINCHED FOR A MOMENT.
And now the work was we'll nigh
done, and the daring miners who had
been pent so long in this living grave
were looking joyfully forward to the
speedy end of their dreadful task, when,
almost at the last moment, it was sud-
denly discovered that by some fatal
error the two cuttings which were ap-
preaching each other from opposite
| sides of the ice dam were proceeding on
different levels, and could never meet
unless slanting passage were cut from
| one TO the other. This fresh labor oc-
cupied two whole days, during which
| the devoted men fairly gave themselves
up for lost, deeming it impossible to
complete the additional work before the
| food rose to the mouth of the tunnel
and drowned them all where they stood.
But at length the last stroke was given,
the workmen retired, the water began
| 10 pour lreely tnrOugn tne tunnel, anu
the hiss and splash of its first leap into
the dry channel below was answered by
deep and heartfelt ''thank God!" from
every man in that heroic band.
Then there came, in the very moment
of triumph, the blackest horror of the
whole tragedy. Already the mass OF
water above the dam was visibly re-
duced and the gallant ejoicing
in the thought that their valor and per-
severance had redeemed from death
the lives OF allI1 that breathed
in the valley-werei just staring
to return to their homes, when,
unexpected as lightning from cloud
less sky, the long delayed destruction
came. The constant Chammering of the
escaping waters, as they fell in one
great cataract right upon the base o
the ice dam, infiictedlupon the latter {
shock which, weakened as it alread!
was by the tremendous pressure from
above, it was quite unable to sustain
With crash more terrific than thu
loudest thunder, the whole of thu
mighty mass gave way, and volume o
, water TO which Niagara itself woulC
, have seemed small, fell like a thunder
bolt right upon the doomed valley.