The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1897-05-06
MISSISSIPPI FLOODS.
Scenes OF Desolation and Death
Along the Great River.
Hundreds of Homes and Millions of
Fertile Acres Laid In Waste by
the surging Waters-
Changing Channels.


Fertile Acres Laid An Waste by
the surging waters-
Changing Channels.
Did the reader ever travel on Missis-
sippi river steamboat from St. Louis
to New Orleans during an overflow?
If 80, he has seen a condition Of waste
and desolation that sickened the heart
and one defies the Imagination to ac-
curately describe. 1t is a long line of
blackness and despair, with the surface
of the muddy waters covered with float
ing timbers, wrecked houses, eddies of
swollen dead animals, with an OCCASION
al lifeless human being mixed with the
debris. From foothill to foothill there
Is nothing but q sea Of black water.
There is an occasional mound to be
seen, and on these are sometimes to be
found grouped shivering, trembling an
mals, wild and tame.
I took skiff one morning at Gold
Dust landing, and was rowed out in the
black waters four miles toward the
hills. Upon q little promontory of q
half-acre size we saw cattle, hogs,
sheep, coons, rabbits, deer and one bear,
standing together, trembling with fear
as they watched the fast-rising waters
that must soon envelop them. They
did not frighten at our approach, but
appeared as though glad to see us,
walking far out into the water as If ap-
pealing for help. Every man in the
boat had gun, but none dared to use
1t. No one said anything about shoot
ing, each apparently waiting for the
other to speak. But as we rowed away
looking for helpless family reported
: to be in that vicinity, deputy sheriff
remarked that he thought some men
were humane after all, and nobody dis
puted him.
If the flood that came in 1892, when
its warning had been sent forward more
than q month in advance, destroyed
growing crops and property to the value
Of over $2,OO0,0OO, what must be the ex-
tent of damage this year, when the
rivers south are already higher than
they were during 1892? And then the
war department advises that the waters
will continue to rise indefinitely. From
st. Louis to Cairo, all of that immense
basin that was created by the earth
quake so years ago is deep enough to
swim q steamboat. This section en-
braces a remarkably big part of the
wheat fields of southern Illinois and
Missouri. The submerged farms may
be entirely useless for grain purposes
for the remainder of the year. 1t takes
growing wheat long time to recover
from food, however short the period
may be that it has suffered. So If the
Missouri and Illinois valleys are not in
stantly drained the fall wheat crop
there is gone.
But it is south Of Cairo and clear
down to New Orleans where the real
$ damage is now being done. That is the
part of the country that lies unprotect-
ed, where millions of acres of fertile
fields and hundreds of homes belong
ing to the laboring people are absolute
ly at the mercy of the remorseless wa
ters. The lowlands are so much more
productive than the hill country that
the highlands have almost been aban-
doned of late years, the farmers going
TO the Bottoms to raise their produce.
Until Memphis is reached there are no
levees to speak of. There are few, to
be sure, but they are as chaff in a storm
when big flood comes. They seem to
excite the rivers wrath all the more.
Tennessee is but aAlittle affected even
at the highest stagek of the river. The
banks on the left are high and are sup
ported by rocky hills that creep up al
most to the rivers edge. Thus the vol
. ume of water is thrown with all its ter
rible force to the unprotected sides of
Arkansas territory, backing up the
small rivers and streams, causing
them to overflow lakes, thus creating
an inland sea that adds new territory
to its cruel waste hour by hour until the
entire surplus waters of the north have
gone to join the salty waves of the
southern seas.
And how cruelty coquettish this Mis-
sissippi river has been, changing town
sites, creating new channels, robbing
the soil of one plantation to give to an
other. Vicksburg is high and dry,
three miles away from the river, where
as few years ago the business part of
the town sat snugly on its banks.
AOOA dI OTecuNuN. 4cu ycurS dSo tuc
city was two miles further westward
than it now lies. 1t ha9been driven back
gradually until if it retreats much fur
ther it will jam itself up against lake
that sometimes gets mad herself. Thus
the poor town is as if between the devil
and the deep sea- There's Natchez, too.
You remember "Natchez Under the
Hill?" Well. there is no "under the
hill" now. It's steep declivity from
the town to the river. Passengers leav-
ing the steamboats, there have to climb
up gangplanks, just as if they were 60
ing up tree. And there is Memphis,
that, according to the way the river is
acting thereabouts at present NAV be