The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1895-04-26
|MONTREAL'S HORROR
Scenes of Terror and Agony
About the Burning To-
baCCo Factory.
ONE MORE GIRL DEAD
Upper Floors Of the Building
Wrecked = Figuring Up the
Losses-Fireman Hurt.

MONTREAL. April &c, 1Ss5.-The ruins
of the Macdonald tobacco factory were
visited this morning by an enormous
number of sight-seers. The strets were
black with people attracted by curiosity
and other motives. Nearly 10000 people
were present at about ten o'clock.
The two upper stories and the tower OF
the factory have disappeared, but there
appears no danger of the remainder OF
the walls falling down. The flames are
completely extinguished to all appear
ance. but a few firemen are still playing
upon the ruins as matter of precau-
ton. A number of employees, men and
women. are on the spot. and are objects
of universal attraction being beset with
demads for accounts of their experiences.
One girl says she jumped from fourth
story window and escaped without in
jury. but her story seems hardly credible
and she was apparently strongly excited
as she related her adventures. Ida For
tin. and Alphonsin Thibadeau are ex-
pected to die today. When the fremen
turned out at five o'clock last night and
raced to the corner of Ontario and Iber-
vile streets. they realized at glance
that hard task was in store for them.
TWELVE HUNDRED IN IT.
In the huge five-story Macdonald build
ing. was packed some 1900 people and
the flames wer already showing in the
drying and heating room where the fire
broke out. The work of rescue was
speedily seen to be a difficult one. La
front Of each window was a thick wire
gauze. which was in a few cases torn off
by the frantic girls in their efforts to
gain liberty. To the great horro of the
panic stricken multitude below, one of
the girls. half-orazed with fear. made a
leap for life and was dashed almost, to
pieces on the pavement below.
Like so many sheep, many others fol-
lowed her. A great many of them man.
aged to land on the top of the shed and
thus break their fall. Fortunately the
firemen We're gradually able to put up
ladders to the fourth fioorNnd thus res-
cue the majority of the half~hundred wo-
men who Were working there, many OF
whom had tainted. For half an hour
dawn S addsp OF 45e1
in many cases the work had to be stop
ped because the flames would break out
the work at ss yegg place wss sey
eral instances the clothing of the women
caught. fire and many of them reached the
80 '' A TERRIBLE s15LE SCENE
The scene which the street presented
was most terrible one. The surging
NiOWQ u SlSntSGeTS, CoElpOS0Q IAdluly OF
friends and relatives of the employees,
praying and beseeohing the firenen to
save their loved ones; the clang- of the
engine and ambulance bells, the roar
of the fremen as they shouted orders
to one another and the agonizing
shrieks of the poor women locked up in
the upper stories who thought their last.
hour had surely come, combined to make
a scene almost beyond description. The
greatest horror Of all came when three
fremen, Viau, Charette and Burwell,
were caught on the very roof as the
flames burned through. Yiau and Char
cite managed to escape by means of
rope and a ladder, but Burwell found ev-
e-ry, avenue cut off, with the flames
gradually closing around him The sighk
was agonfzing. He alternately raised
his hands. in prayer and shouted to the
sake. Priests. their soutannes trailing
in the mud, were murmuring prayers IN
the street below, and no ladders were
long enough te reach him, he seemed
doomed, when a number of young volun-
teers, after lashing several ladders to-
gether, made a venture and finally
brought him dow n.
VISITING THE INJURED.
This morning Mr.. Macdonald visited
all the hospitals and took the names of
his injured employees. 1t is rumored that
one woman is missing, but the work
of searching the ruins had not yet been
commenced. The total loss as now Of
equally divided between building and
stock.
There are about twenty-five persons
injured at the hospitals, including one
One of the most serious cases received
at the hospital was that of Alphcnse
Thibadeau, twenty-six Years old, living
at No. 454 Plessis street. She had been
the window and had also fractured har
back. She died at 11:30 this morning. {.