Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1890-03-08
STILL INCREASING
The Deaths as a Re, ult Of the
Arizona Dam Disass or Will
Reach 100.
A. Messenger Who Got Drunk
Might Have Saved Many
Lives.
The Scene Along h Hassayamapa
Valley Battles Description
The Story OF an Eye
Witness.
The Death List Growing,


PRESCOTT, Ariz., Feb. 2s.-Two pros
p~ectors, Moses and Robert Moore, arriy-
ing from the upper Walnut Grove dam,
state that Friday afternoon the shperin:
tendent, seeing that the dam must in
evitably go, sent a messenger to the
lower dam to notify them Of the dan
ger, but he stopped at a saloon on the
road and, becoming intoxicated, failed
to deliver the message. Next morning
another messenger was sent, but owing
to the fury of the storm was overtaken
and drowned by the flood just as he
neared the lower camp. Sheriff O'Neill
has returned to Phoenix from the scene
of the Walnut dam disaster with an ad-
ditional list Of victims. The list Of the
dead will probably reach sixty-five or
seventy.
Tho scene along the Hassayamapa
valley through which the waters rushed
is one absolutely impossible to even
partially describe. No tornado could
have made such a wreck. For miles the
creek is filled with dead bodies, trees,
cacti, bouldors Of size and
weight, and every imaginable kind Of
debris. Out Of the unknown number Of
the dead but twelve bodies have SO far
been recovered, and nearly all of these
were found at points from twenty to
thirty miles below the spot from which
the flood swept Thorn.
An eyewitness Of the terrible disaster
thus describes it: "a perpendicular wall
of water nearly 100 feet high swept
down the valley, crushing everything
inits path. Boulders of prodigious weight
were tossed upon the huge waves like
so many feathers. Trees were literally
torn into splinters. Huge iron beams
were picked up and sent dancing on the
mighty torrent like so many pieces Of
cork. Several Of these were found
twisted and bent and imbedded in the
rocky walls of the canyons Ave and ten
miles below where the dam stood. A
large steel safe, weighing nearly two
tons, was swept away and has not yet
been found. 1t contains 81, 200.
Walnut Grove is situated forty miles
south Of Prescott, and the dam was COM
pleted in 1873. 1t was constructed Of
stone. 1t lay in the typical position Of
such structures, closing the narrow out
let OF a wide valley. Its situation, in
the interior and many miles from q
railroad, precluded the use of cement,
while the sides Of the very canyon it
closes furnishes an i~nexhaustible sup
ply Of the best granite. The dam was
q wedge-shaped core Of loose rock
thrown in just as it was blasted from
the hillside and kept in place and shape
by wide back and front walls. These
walls were hand laid, but were with
out cement. With no further protec-
ton the water would, of course, flow
away almost as fast as if no dam were
there. This protection was supplied by
a double apron or skin OF three-inch
planks, lined with tarred felting, calked
and painted with waterproof paint,
covering the whole water face OF the
dam, and resembling in many ways the
side of a ship. The dam was Ito feet
high, and the lake which then formed
the largest body Of water in Arizona,
covered a surface of $50 acres and inn
pounded 1000, oOO, 900 gallons.