The Forrest City times., 1894-09-07
Heaps of Dead and Dishgured Bodies Five Feet High-Seeking to Identify Lost Friends-A
 Seeming Hopeless Task.
A Silhouette of Human Agony Out lined Against the Horizon-A Weird and Dreadful Scene-Mollie
 McNeil's Path etic Story.
Relief for the Fire Sufferers-An Inde- scribable Scene at Shell Lake, Wis., consin-Firebugs at Work
 and Several Arrested.
Special Correspondent at the Scene of
 the Holocaust.

A Special Correspondent at the Scene of
 the Holocaust.
 ST PAUL, Minn.. Sept. 3.-A special to the Morning Call from Hinckley. Minn., says: A Call reporter boarded the first train out of Pine City for Hinckley at o'clock this morning. It was work train, but carried many members of the different committees appointed at Pine City last evening As the train neared Mission Creek the first physical evidences of the great fire became apparent. The whole coun- try was singed. The telegraph wires were down. and the scene was one of desolation incarnate. Mission Creek was a small shanty surrounded by a potato patch. It was the only house standing, the depot buildings and the mill being but mass of smoking ruins
 The train proceeded slowly three miles further to Hinckley. The round- house and coal sheds of the Eastern Minnesota road only remained. West on this road was long line of smoking ruins of freight cars, probably not less than fifty in number.
 The train halted at HinclSley and the scene of woe and dissolution which broke upon the vision beggars descrip- tion. The gaunt skeleton of the pub lie school alone remained standing in the center of the village. Alongside the railroad track were two score of boxes filled with the bloated and dis figured remains of victims of the fire The reporter read some of the inscrip- tions as follows: Supposed remains of Mrs. Blanchard, horribly distorted" Girl, 10 years old, no clothing" Three children of Mrs. Martinson,'' 7 and in the next box Mrs. Martinson laid. Then came John Wendbund and child and a number more unidentified.
 A Sight to Freeze the Blood.
 If you want to see a sight to freeze your blood" said F. J. Donnelly, Ego out to the cemetery from which have just returned" The reporter picked his way through the deserted avenues of the village, encountering the burst ing remains of horses. cows. cats, chickens and dogs. He overlook Hans Paulson, an employe in the Brennan mill 'sl am going out to the cemetery to see if l can find my wife and four children" he said. II lost them all." Then he burst into tears
 The rain began pouring down in sheets. We reached the cemetery, a mile and a half from town and noted . half dozen men digging trench, bat oh! the dread horror of that heap of bodies lying on knoll in the mid dle of the cemetery. Here were nine ty-six bodies, men, women and chil- dren, seorched, blackened, distorted, bowels and brains protruding, hands clutched in their final agonies, hair singed from heads. Old, young, mid- dle aged, male and female, all in a dread promiscuous heap. No words of the imagination can describe the dreadful reality. 1t was there pres ent, but even then the mind could hardly accept the evidence. It did not seem that anything so fearful, so un- speakably dreadful could result from a few hours forest fire. Dante never imagined such a scene in the deepest inferno, nor Dore picture so dire sight.
 In another corner of the cemetery were forty-five more bod ies, covered with. quilts. All were inferred late this afternoon.
 Hans .Pauison's Gruesome Search.
 Hans Pauison, who had accompanied the reporter, delved among the horrid pile of bodies five feet high, and finally pulled out the remains of little fe- male child with only slight shreds of white clothing remaining on her body. He scanned the face, critically exam ined the clothing and then broke ont in lamentations.
 ..Yes, yes; it is my poor little kid. My God. Yes, it is she; and my other children; oh. where can l find them? How can I hope to identify them in that blackened mass?" But he kept up the quest, and the reporter left him there in the driving storm, sll- houette of human agony outlined aoainst the horizon-a weird and dreadful scene.
 The reporter encountered among the ruins of liinclley beautiful young girl. who was making vain search for her trunk. She was dressed in a Iight colored calico dress which some pood Samaritan in Pine City had given