The Portland daily press., 1898-11-28
Tremendous Loss to Shipping All
Along the Coast.
On shore the Blizzard Was Equally Em-
phatic-Sfreet Street Traffic Was Sus-
pended i'm Nearly Every New England
CITY and Railroads Were Blocked
With Snow--Great Damage Done by
the Gale.

the Boston and Maine railroad, nau bne
added difficulty of frequent washouts In
places exposed to the heavy seas. Trains
north, east, south and west were nearly
all stalled early in the night. although
one train from Bangor reached Lynn this
noon, and two Chicago trains came into
the city this morning.
In cities and towns dependent upon the
electric car service, 1t was even worse, for
the damp snow packed hard on the rails
and held up even the heavy snow
ploughs. The service in this city was
probably the best Of any of the surround
+ ing communities yet, even here, there
was no attempt made to run more than q
dozen cars on Washington street and one
or two Others of the main thoroughfares.
The storm, while not SO severe and far
reaching in its effects as the fearful bliz-
zard of last February, was, nevertheless,
the heaviest experienced in Novemb Der IN
this part of the country for long series
of years. Coming on Sunday, it did not,
OF course, oause the annoyance or ineon :
! yanisnce that would have been che case
on O week day, and most of the trans
portation companies made a heroic effort
to at least partially recover from the
eff of the blockade.
Only the barest reports were received
up to six O'Clock tonight, of the effects of
the storm on the coast, but even those few
lines gave rise to the gravest fears as TO
the safety of what little shipping there
may have been off Cape Cod last night OF
today. 1t will probably be two or three
days before complete list of the disasters
can be made, and tonight. the only hope
in shipping circles is that 1T may be a
small one and not prove repetition OF
the fearful scene along the coast which
marked the February blizzard. The
storm was combination of two dis.
turbances one which came over the lakes
yesterday, and another that formed Off
the Florida coast yesterday morning.
With the storm center off the south
eastern coast. the greater part of New
England was swept by northeast gal e
which in some places reached the velocity
of sixty miles an hour.
All points south OF this city and east OF
EIONlQ6QCe H6F6 lSUldt6Q Ill ohs OfO-
ming, New Bedford being lost to the out
side world before eight O'Clock, while
N ewport and Fall River disappeared into
the night not long after, and up TO late
hour tonight none of these cities as well
as Taunton and other localities IN 5na5
section had emerged from the darkness.
Farther to the vest at Provldence, ana
! in other parts of Rhode island, commun1
cation was intermittent and subject TO
great delays and while the telegrapnlc
! lines were frequently Interrupted, the
telephone companies with their heavy
copper wire managed to maintain some
sort Of communication nearly all night
| Night trains over the Shors line to New
York reached Providence with only rew
minutes delay. But beyond that point
they met terrific drifts and 1T was morn
ing before either of the two regular trains
reached New London. Here they were
stalled nearly all day by freight WRECKS
or the road between that point ana New
Haven. Among the passengers on the
| first train were Col. Roosevelt and
number of prominent Nav York gentle
men besides Miss Maud Adams and one,
or two members of her company.
| The officials of the New Haven road
made every endeavor to get this train
through to New York by night and were
| finally successful. The train from New
York met similar experience west or
| Say brook and after some hours of tele-
| graphing they managed to reach New
London and started late in the afternoon
for Providence.
The electric car service in Providence
and Pawtucket was demoralized during
last evening and today not car ran in
either city and from the present aspect of
| the streets it seems likely that 1t will be
day or two before traffic is resumed.
| Along the Albany road the greatest
difficulty seemed to be in getting trains
up the well known hill between Worcester
and Charlton and two or three engines
were necessary to pull the New York
train up the grade last night. A heavy
freight wreck at East brookne did not
help matters 80 that it was noon today be-
fore any trains attempted to reach Boston
from Springfield. At that hour the