The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1892-09-11


by the cholera.
The Hamburger's diet at present is 9 care
tul one The best prevention is not 20 eat
anything that has not undergone boiling
point OF heat, temperature that Is said 10
be fatal TO the cholera bacilli. The conse-
quence is that dealers in butter, cheese and
green groceries are doing no business at all.
Salads are forbidden, and fruits are
not to be considered. Every
one washes with water that has been
boiled, and even then uses a 5 per cent.
solution OF carOohc acid in IL. The entire
city smells Of disinfActants. In all the pub
lie buildings salts are strewn upon the stair
ways and halls and piled in the corners.
The same is true of private offices and
hotels, where walters and pages are con-
tinually spraying themselves and the guests
with various disinfecting fluids.
Through the courtesy of Acting United
States Consul Charles II. Burke the Sun re-
porter was yesterday invited by DR..
Sehamer, private secretary to Senator
Hachmann, who Is chief Of police.
to visit the two cholera hospitals and
the other municipal institutions for the
control Of the epidemic.
Our first visit was to the new mortuary
on Jrgfelder strasse, near the old general
hospital A vacant lot had been tempo
rsrily converted iEto a morgue, and large
wooden shed erected. As fer as we could
see In Borgfelder strasse long lines of
mourning carriages stretched back on both
sides OF the street, with their
noddinG plumes and somber trappiugs.
throng Of children were gathered at the en-
trance TO the mortuary, but they were as
huShed aud silent as their elders. Gloom
was upon the locality. This was the SPOT
where the bodies of the better class Of ohol-
era victims were buried, those whose
friends could afford carriages and pro-
fessional mourners. So many funerals were
In progress, however, that some mourners
were compelled to wait hours for the op-
portunity to bring their dead TO the hearses.
A glance along this double line Of mourn
Ing carriages gave some idea OF the Impair
tiality with which the plague selects its
victims from old and young. In one oar
rtage four fearful children sat, evidently on
their way to the burial Of a father or
mother, or perhaps both. In another a
young widow sat alone In others fathers
and mothers were waiting for the hearse to
bring out the bodies of their children. At
least ten hearses were In the mortuary yard,
and a score of men were handling the cot
fms, while groups of the professional mourn
ers, in their somber uniforms, gathered
about that particular corpse that they were
paid to mourn, and directed its transporta-
ton 20 the hearse. In a shed were perhaps
twenty bodies OF men and women, all
wound about in white disinfectIng cloth and
emitting the powerful odor of carbolic acid.
Each corpse had paper pinned 20 its wrap
pings bearing number which correspondent
to the names that were registered by the
mortuary clerk. Men were lifting these
bodies into the oofflus, others were screwinR
down the coffin lids, and still others were
carrying the coffins to the hearses, under
the direction of chief of staff, with the
same regularity and industry that one wit
nesses in a well regulated Workshop.
In the corner OF the shed nearest the door
were six little collins ranged in a row some
with wreaths OF flowers upon them. Each
was decorated with a label which contained
the name and age OF the victim, and name
and address OF Its parents. The greatest age
that had haen reached by the former oocu>
pants Of these small bodies was years,
and on the Huiest coffin of all these vas a
mark drawn across the printed form In the
place where the age should have been re-
corded
This spot was grwesome enough, but was
cheerful compared with the mortuary where
those victims who are buried by charity
were prepared for their final resting place
visited the charnel house on Monday with
a member of the staff Of the Hamburger
NGchrichten. Here, in the edge Of an old
graveyard whose tombstones were falling
down and whose graves were over
grown with weeds, were more than
400 human bodies In various stages of
preparation for burial On one side of an i'm
provised road way was a stack Of cottins
higher than a mans head and at least TWEEN
ty feet long, from which four workmen
were loading a great van 10 preparation for
a night strip to OhlsdoFf. Two or three
other vans were waiting for a chance to
load, and the drivers and workingmen were
chatting each other and laug hing as IL theirs
was a most ordinary and commonplace oc-
cupation. Further along from a carpenters
wagon was being unloaded an installment
of new coftins.
But the most ghastly sight that I have
witnessed In this city of horrors was at the
OF a tumble-down shed, were laid the
corpses, just as they had been brought
from the hospitals after death, of 100 men,
women and children. Most OF these bodies
were ar jagged in the coarse bed dress OF
the hospitals, but there were others
in the battered garments In which they had
been brought from their homes when strick-
en- down. showing how quickly the deadly
mAladY had done its work These bodies
were oontarted In all sorts Of shapes, Just as
death had left them. The body Of one man
who had died In a suit Of underclothes, with
his stockings on, had his knees drawn up
almost to his ohm, and as this circumstance
caused him 30 take up more than his share
of room on the floor Of the shed, he had been
laid sideways, and the bodies Of two chill
dren were at his head and feet
The body OF woman was bent back
nearly double just as she had died in an
a Vful spasm. and others had their arms
stretched above their heads as they had
struggled before the vital spark left them.
Among these corpses, staring with their
dead eyes open, worked a dozen men
strengthening the rigid limbs into shape and
wrapping them about like mummies in the
clothes in which they we're to
be buried. Each body was then fast
ened to a narrow board reaching from head
10 feet, with heavy string, IN order that it
might remain in proper shape, and then In
a further shed they were piled one above
the other on racks until their collins should
be made ready. The comparison il a brutal
one, but the racks With their enshrouded
occupants reminded me Of a packing house
where slaughtered sheep were being pre-
pared for transportation.
From the new InortUary we drove to the
general hospital in Lohmulen strasse. |
had visited this institution upon my arrival
in Hamburg and had seen DR.. Yolasse, the
head OF the institution. He told me that 1t
was impossible TOR him TO show me through
the hospital, as 1t was absolutely forbidden,
both because the physicians and attendants
were SO busy ministering 70 the dead and
dying and because Wait was attended by
great risk to the visitor. On this day,
Monday, a crowd was gathered at
the outer gate Of the hospital