The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1893-12-06
A DAY OF ACCIDENTS.
An Aged Coiored Woman Dies-A Horse
Breaks His Neck-Twc Children Gre
mated III Their Own House.
7Special to The Herald and News. I

Especial to The Herald and News.]
PROSPERITY, s. c., Dec. 5.-Yester-
day was day Of misfortune and sad.
ness in the history Of our colored
friends in Prosperity and vicinity.
The usual quiet and serenity OF our
town was broken by the announcement
yesterday morning, of ihe sudden death
Of an aged colored woman, Caroline
Rice, of Columbia, who was living here,
with her son, Rev. II. E. Lewis. She
was a respectable Christian woman,
aged about 6S years. Paralysis was the
cause of death.
Quickly following this announce
ment, was the running away in town
of a good horse attached to a buggy,
belonging to Washington Dominick. a
well-to-do colored man. The horse
became frightened at passing train,
broke loose from where he was hitched
and had not run more than fifty yards,
before the buggy overturned, the horse
fell and broke bis neck. This is severe
loss to Wash in these hard times.
The colored people had not recovered
from the excitement attendant to these
two events, when it was widely an
nounced that holocaust had occurred
on the "Spence place. about two miles
from town. This correspondent i'm
nediately proceeded to the scene of
desolation, misery and death. Upon
arrival a sickening sight presented it.
self. The comfortable home, of Levi
Bauknight and wife had passed into
ashes and smoke, and amid the burning
Goals was the crisp remains OF their
two little girls, one aged five years and
the other nearly two years. The facts
as I could gather them from the suffer
ing husband and father are these:
Bauknight's wife was in child bed with
an infant just week old. He, himself,
has been having chills and fever. His
wife complained, of cold feet, and asked
l. him to heat a Drick and place to her
feet. He did 80. In short time his
wife told him to remove the brick that
it was too hot. Upon removing the
brick he found that the bedding had
caught fire from the hot bricS.
Bauknight now seems to have utter
ly lost bis senses, and instead of easily
extinguishipg, what was evidently !
very small affair, his efforts only tended
to excite and fan the little fire until il
became blaze. His wife managed tt
get out of the bed on the floor. HI
then just began fighting the fame, ano
threw an old quilt around his sick wife
and carried her out into the field. h
returned for the infant, secured it, anc
carried it to its mother, thinking to re
turn for bis other two children who
were shut up in the other end OF tn
house, but he found that the old quill
had ignited, or was on fire when n
carried his wife out, and had set hi
wife's thin clothes on fire, and in hi
mad frantic efforts to extinguish hi
wife's clothing, his own caught fire
What an awful ordeal of mental ant
bodily suffering for Bauknight aud hi
wife. Their two little girls burning VI
in the house, with no means Of escape
| and they themselves both Burning ant
| helpless. At this critical juucture,
passing colored man came to thei
rescue, and in cool calm manner, sue
ceeded in extinguishing the fame
from he burning clothes of Bauknigh
and his wife, but too late to render an.
assistance to the little girls in the house
-Bauknight was so bereft of reasol
when his rescuer, Jim Bridges arrived
that he was making no effort to ex
tinguish either himself or wife, bu
was lying fat on the ground fac
downward with his clothes burning Of
his back, seemingly perfectly uncons
cious of his torture. The house was
good new frame building and burne'
very rapidly. The physician think
that while Bauknight and bis wife ar
painfully burned, they are not serious
and unless the exposure and shock Q
the wife proves unfavorable, they wi!
both get well.
We have often heard of persons es
Gaping from burning building wit
only the "clothes on the backs" bu
these two unfortunate people did no
even save the "clothes on their backs
as they are badly burned. YU.BE.