Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1894-09-08
; AN AWFUL HOLOCAUST.

by Dreadful Forest Fires In Drought
kfrickrD Minnesota and Wisconsin,
liBckiey. Mnn., and Other Towns Wiped
Dut of Existence, aud Their Inhabitants
Driven Before the Flames to Awful Death
"a Tfain-Load Of Refugees Saved from
Death by the Heroism OF an Engineer
and His Equally Brave Fireman.
ST PAUL, Mimi, Sept. Only the
horrors which accompanied the historic
Chicago fire can be cited to compare
with the terrible scenes and expert
ences in the flame-swept region of Pine,
Kanabec and Carlton counties Of Min
nesota. and Burlett county, Wisconsin.
At least 400 settlers, their families
and others were burned to death
or suffocated before the flames
reached them, and the death list
may reach another hundred or more.
The people Of Hinckley, which was
q Psi Snsrous town in Pine county sixty
seven miles southwest Of Duluth, are
now dead or homeless and destitute.
At a conservative estimate $50 men,
women and children of this doomed
town were unable to escape from the
merciless, swiftlyadvancing sheets of
flame. They fell on the railroad tracks
or on the old territorial road either to
be cremated or die the more merciful
death from suffocation by the clouds
of dense smoke and heat-laden atmos-
phere.
The number of corpses already re-
covered from the blackened waste at
and around what was Hinckley is $50,
the majority being women and chill
dren who had not the strength to fight
the destroyer or escape by fleeing to a
place of safety. So far as can be
learned at this time from the devastated
district, the following towns have been
destroyed and the following are dead
in numbers:
Hinckley, Mimi, 1000 to $4,000 in
habitants; go to 800 dead, 500 to 500
| homeless.
Pokegama, Mimi. next station south
west of Hinckley, 500 inhabitants; so
dead.
Mission Creek, next station south of
Hinckley, on the st, Paul & Duluth
railroad; 10 people dead,
Sandstone Junction, Mimi, next sta
tion north Of lIinckley, on the st. Paul
and Duluth road: % dead.
Sandstone. second station north of
Hinckley, on the Eastern Minnesota
road; so dead.
Cromwell, Mimi, Carlton county:
dead unknown.
Miller. MINI, near Hinckley, off
railroad line; dead unknown.
Shell Lake, Baronette, Granite Lake,
Cumberland, Pineville, Comstock and
Forest City. lumber towns in Wiscon.
sin, between Chippewa Falls and Su-
perior.
Spooner, Wis, partly destroyed.
| The number of dead in these Wis
consin towns and in other parts of the
country, between Chippewa Falls and
Superior, is estimated at 100 persons.
The Minnesota confagration, which
was attended by the shocking loss OF
life and agony of body and mind for
hundreds of others who escaped with
their lives only, swept everything and
everybody in its path from Pine City
as far west as Carlton. near Duluth.
The great valley between Kettle
river and Cross lake, which few days
ago was in no danger of destruction
by the forest fires raging in the lumber
states, is nov one vast area of ashes
and cinders, with here and there an
oasis in the desert of devastation in the
form of half-dried lake, standing
farm building or a clump of timber.
/ The bodies of the known and unknown
dead, which dot the heated and black
ened eXpansc give the scene the ap.
pearance of a battlefield in which fire
has played the conquering role.
As the survivors of the Johntown
food escaped before the avalanche OF
water, and as the locomotive bore the
warning Of approaching disaster at
that time. so did hundreds of human
beings seek a place of salty from the
flames by riding behind the rushing
locomotive which bore the Limited
train back towards Duluth after jim
Root, the brave engineer had taken his
train into the midst of the flames.
The escape of hundreds from what
seemed certain death between walls OF
flame on each side of the railroad track
and the evident saving of these human
souls by the heroic acts and fidelity to
duty of the engineer and fireman OF
the train will be handed down in the
annals of calamities as masterpieces OF
heroism
The retreat Of the train, laden with
human freight, would not have been
accompanied with any loss of life had
it not been for the two Chinaman who
perished from being paralyzed with
fright. They were rooted beneath
their seats, and We're consumed with
the train at Skunk Lake. The wooden
construction of every building in
linckley except the Great Northern
|
the rushing tidal wave of fame to OBJ.
literate every trace of the town except
the walls of these two structures.
One of the heaviest financial suffer-
ers from the pine forest fire is the
Cornell university. The trustees of
this institution had invested over
Sl,000,0O0 in the burned pine lands.
As is often the case in times of peril to
a large number of people, many go tc
their deaths because Others lead and the
leaders do not follow the safe path.
Survivors of the Hinckley holocaust
say that over 200 of those who per
ished in flames or smoke might have
saved their lives if they had kept away
from the river.
Scores of bodies of fugitives were
found on the roadside as we'll as on the
railroad tracks. Smoke, fire or ex'
haustion had overtaken them in theil
race for life. And the half of the hor.
rors caused by this calamity to pros
porous people has apparently not beer
told.
The sending of relief trains and pro
visions, besides other necessities of ex'
istence in homeless community, ant
physicians supplied with things for the
injured, was commenced with com
mendable promptness and on liberia
scale by the citizens of Duluth, St
Paul, Minneapolis, Chippewa Falls
Superior, st. Cloud and other cities o
| the StatA