The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1896-06-04
THE NUMBER OF FATALITIES
FROM THE PANIC SAID TO
REACH OVER 1000.
THE SEARCH FOR MISSING FRIENDS
Dead and Dying-The Gar and
Czarina Visit the Injured in
the Hospital.


stantly gaining in proportion as the in
designations by the authorities continue.
They are made under difficulties, as the
recovery of the victims was conducted
by hundreds of volunteers, and many
were carried away before they were
enumerated. Many additional deaths of
the injured who were carried away are
occurring which are only added to the
enumeration after some time. 1t is now
said that the fatalities will amount to
between 1000 and 5000, but it is impos-
sible yet to ascertain accurately the ex-
tent of the disaster. An official state
ment issued this morning places the dead
at 1853 and the fatally injured at 2S6,
but in contrast with this official state
ment there are 1852 corpses lying this
afternoon at the cemetery besides the
many dead and dying that are known
to have been recovered from the Inflated
field by friends.
This evening, after receiving deputa-
tons, the car and czarina attended and
danced at the brilliant ball at the French
embassy. Preparations had been made
on a most elaborate scale for this ball,
and it is asserted that $4,000 was ex-
pended on the supper alone. The car
ina was not informed yesterday of the
disaster, owing to her delicate cond-
ton.
While the dance within the French
embassy continued amid all the ac-
compartments of luxury and gaiety dis
fri lie md ,lnft ,lN,,n Il
| over the desolate plain among the dead
and the dying, looking in vain for their
missing.
Today requiem mass was said i'll a
| chapel of the Kremlin at which the car
and czarina and all the members of the
imperial family attended.
The city is filled today with grief
| stricken crowds. 1t is striking evil
dence of the vast multitude who took
part in yesterdays fetes that there
were large numbers who were totally
unaware of the number of lives among
them that had been crushed out, and
who proceeded with their merry-making
throughout the day without having
grasped the fearful proportions of the
disaster. Even up to a late hour at
night people refused to believe that there
could have been so many lives lost. But
today thousands of persons are crowding
to the Khodijonskje plain searching for
relatives and friends.
| The work of identifying the dead is
most difficult, both ON account of the
large number of victims and the tram
pied, torn and mutilated condition of
many of the cOrpses, some of whom were
/ crushed beyond the possibility of recog-
| milton, and almost beyond semblance to
humanity. The majority of the killed
were peasants from outlying villages,
| though the clothing of some indicated
that they were persons of wealth. The
bodies of number of women. clad in
silks and fine linen, were among those
found. The strangeness to the surround
| ings, so many survivors were seeking for
missing ones, adds to the confusion.
All day yesterday the full force of the
police and firemen worked among the
dead, pulling bodies from heaps of the
killed and injured and ranging them on
the ground, which was covered for hun
| dreds of yards with groups of ten and
| twenty begrimmed blOodstained and dis
| figured corpses, among which the
agonized friends of the missing wander
ed III painful effort to indentify them.
The injured who were mixed with the
| dead suffered terribly from thirst, and
the fever of their unattended injuries.
The work of carrying the bodies to the
cemetery, where it is intended to inter
those who fail of identification CON
tinued all night and yesterday, and this
morning the forces at work ON the plain
discovered the mouth of an unused well
in the middle of a field. In the well
there were thirty dead bodies and
wedged in among them, and held down
by their weight were found two men
awe and comparatively unnjured
physically, but the hideous surroundings
of the night had proven too great a
strain ON their minds and they were
raving maniacs.
There are countless incidents of special
pathos, one case being that of party of
fifty-tive humble peasants who had come
together from single village for the
merry-making at the cars feast. OF
this party fifty-three, or all but two,
were killed.
Various versions as to the origin of
the stampede and crush are current,
but the account to which the most Gre
dence is attached is to the effect that the
wagons laden with the 100000 souvenirs
to be distributed among the people were
proceeding to the Khodijonskje plain,
followed by a multitude of eager peas
ants, when the attendants, with a view
of pleasing the people, threw number of
souvenirs among the crowd. There was
a wild scramble towards the point where
thSoC iSii, anu thC hCWo SpTtdu ike WIFI
fire down the throngs of expectant peas
ants that the distribution had COM
menced. This resulted in heading,
pell nell rush for the booths where the
distribution of the souvenirs was to have
been made later The arrangements
which it was intended to make to keep
the crowds in order during .l,e distribu-
ton had not been completed ut that early
hour and the force on hand was power
less to stem the tide of the crush of
humanity. What added greatly to the
gravity of the disaster was the circum-
stance that these booths were surround
ed by bitches: The foremost persons in
the. crowd fell PROSTATE in these bitches,
and the people following speedily
trampled them to death. Others
stumbled over their bodies and met the
same fate, and so the horror grew. The
pressure was so great on the sides of the
booths from the struggles of the mass of
mad humanity that they gave way and
hundreds of people were forced into
them through the walls. One mounted
gen d'arme near the booths was literally
crushed to death by the plungiag crowds.
There were no English people or Ameri-
cans among the victims. Many of those
who came for the coronation had
already left the city, and, in any event,
tourists attended the fete only in the
afternoon.
Very few of the victims belonged to