The herald., 1897-04-29
WINDOWS OF THE
HEAVENS OPENED

, were made to rescue the people. I'M
proyised RATS were quickly thrown to-
gether and started out into the mad
stream. Before many of them had been
propelled a couple of yards from shofs
they were twisted and broken by the wa
| ters and the would-be rescuers thrown
| into the stream. Half dozen rescuers
were drowned even before those tney
tried to save had been reached.
| Gus Platt, business manager or the
| Guthrie Leader, and George Wills,
merchant tailor, swan the river at the
risk of their lives and secured boat,
by which q number of persons were
saved.
A negro woman with a babe in her
arms, desperately tried to steady her
self in a tree-top, calling the while for
help. She grew weaker and the baby
slipped into the water and was drowned.
She was finally rescued and said her
family of six had succumbed.
A woman wading from home with her
babe on her head, was seen to go under
and a man swimming the channel to
reach four women and baby in tree
was carried down stream.
Two women and child were carried
away on a bridge further down stream
and one man and two women, in plain
sight of shore, were on a house roof
when it went to pieces. They all per-
| ished.
An old negro woman was seen riding
house-top. The building soon turned
over and she was drowned. Three men.
Walter Olds, Van Dusen and Eugene
Gill, sought to rescue an old man from
rtrt ,o1y n a Y o.
| ing tree and they barely saved them
selves by cambering into another tree.
They were finally rescued on rope sent
to them by means of shotgun and cord.
TO THE RESCUE
Two men secured a small stern wheel
pleasure boat and started to the rescue
of half a dozen men and women lodged
in a tree. The persons were rescued
amid the cheers of the spectators. The
cable holding the craft finally broke and
lit was carried down stream, but ulti-
mately landed safely.
Adjutant- Jameson of the ter
ritorial militia, narrowly escaped with
his family He was forced to wade and
lead his horse with his family in the
buggy.
JOuH 4httI, d5Cd ~, W oS eoPSA6NN " 'A@AO
trying to save a woman who sank before
he reached her. Metz himself was bare
ly rescued.
George Owens, Attorney league Ray
and Dick Pearson were precipitated into
the water while trying to save some peo-
pie and Overs was drowned. The wife
and five children of Wesley McGill, col
ored, were drowned in their home.
Gus Platt and Geoge Willis swan
through the main channel, cut a boat
from it's moorings, saving seven people
and making a landing miles below the
city.
Tonight forty or fifty people could be
seen clinging to trees and roofs of build
ings but could not be reached and will
have to spend the night where they are.
The strength of many may fail them
before morning. If it does nothing but
watery grave awaits them.
The fate of many others who are
known to have been carried down
stream will not be known until day
break, and perhaps not then. 1t is i'm
possible to get any definite news from
the hundreds of rescued people on the
bluffs west of the city, and those who
escaped are rushing franically about
in search of missing ones. The river is
going down rapidly tonight.
WILD RUMORS
1t is impossible even approximately
to estimate the loss of life. When dark
ness settled over the city tonight the
widest stories We're afloat. Many were
claiming that all of fifty lives had beer
lost and not infrequently men were
H. orJ 1oi hot frtI1x hod
ished. Those wilder estimates are un-
questionably exaggerated, but the ex-
aggeration is not to be wondered at if
the frightful incidents of the disaster
are but considered. Lives were lost in
the flood in every direction in plain view
of the few who We're heroically carrying
on the work Of rescue and the many who
stood helpless on the edge of the raging
waters Men, women and children
struggled in the torrent side by side with
horses, cattle and swine, one perishing
here, another there. and in other places
several disappearing together beneath
the flood.
At dark tonight but two bodies have
been recovered.
THE DEATH LIST
The bodies recovered are those of the
following:
Anna Kaiser, a school teacher.
Frank Mayors.
Others known to have been drowned
are:
George Owens.
J. H. Calhoun, wife and child.
Charlie Ruffner.
Mrs. C. Ruffner.
Erastus McGill.
Lena Burk.
Mrs. Watt.
Mrs Wesley McGill and five children.
John Metz.
Mrs. James Montgomery.
Mrs. Dummins.
James Lilly.
Mrs. Dumas.
H. H. Becktinger.
Mrs. Frances Moore.
John Beard.
Mrs. Sue Wilson.