The sun., 1898-01-28
MANY CRYING FOR BREAD.
Hundreds Of People in New Castle
Are Destitute.
SITUATION BECOMES ALARMING
The Mills Are Closed and the People
Are Suffering. DO Not Know From
Where the Next Meal Will
Come.
SITUATION BECOMES ALARMING

This is the word that has much Signil
gance among one-half of the people %
New Castle today.
Starvation!
A careful investigation Of the sit'la
ton in several hundred homes in New
Castle, during. the past week has re-
vealed distressing and saddening con-
dtion of affairs. So distressing indeed
is this condition. that it clearly vic>
with the status of things, among the
poor striking spinners and wcavers in
the town OF New Bedford Mass.
This analogy of the condition OF the
families which depend upon the opera
tion Of the Delaware Iron Works for
their daily bread, with the condition OF
the New Bedford families, is not an cx-
aggeration.
If anything, the comparison iavors
the New Bedford situation. There the
strikers have work to do at the mills if
they will accept the cut made in their
wages.
They and their families are starving
because they refuse to work under the
reduction in their pay. In other words,
they have work to do ifthey see fit % do
it, and take the small compensation con-
nectcd with it.
Different, vastly different, however, is
the situation in New Castle. Glad would
several hundred men and boys of New
Castle be if their circumstances were
even the same as those OF the New Bed
ford people.
Happy indeed would they feel if, like
the New Bedford men they had work to
go to. even under a cut -wage-ratc.
Many homes in New Castle this morn
ing are filled with the hope that work
will come to anxious husbands, fathers,
brothers and sors ere long, at any price.
The cry in New Castle this morning is
for work and not for higher wages.
The extreme dcstitution OF New Castle
homes that exists this morning and has
existed for two or three weeks has been
caused not by a strike, but by the closing
of the main avenue of support.
This support was by no means cXtrav
agant, yet hundreds OF industrious men
and BOYS peacefully and con'entedly ac-
ceptcd it.
When the chance to earn this support
was denied vhcin they went peacefully
to their homes to wait. They have
waited now three or four weeks. and it
now looks as if they will either have to
leave and search employment elsewhere
or starvc
To 60 elsewhere to search employment
some money is necessary, but the qu,s-
ton with them is where will they get it,
For about thirty years the Delaware
Iron Works, has been the source from
which onc-half Of the inhabitants of
the town get their living.
Two weeks previous to Christ
mas the works shut down leaving the
families Of eight hundred men without
employment. When the works will
resume operation no one at New Castle
knows.
The WOODEN mills Of New Castle are
also very slack, employing only one
half of the usual force.
The people who are in need are 50 nu-
merous that the families which are
known to be generous have as many as
twenty unfortunates ut their doors begg-
ing for something to keep their souls and
bodies together.
Many collections to relieve the suffer-
ing ones have been raised but the people
who are able to give are ortnnmbercd
by the ones in need and the funds raised
would not provide victuals for the hun
CRY ones for one day.
The situation is becoming alarming.
as the pcoplu are becoming desperate,
and the inhabitants are in constant fear
that the unfortunate ones will break
into the stores and dwellings and take
provisions by force.
A man who is in position to know
the exact condition Of affairs, when in
tervicwed, said, something will have to
be done, and very soon at that, to give
food to people of New Castle who are
starving. He said soup houses should
be started, as there are many people who
are in destitute circumstances who have
never before known such a thing, and
they cannot maintain the courage to beg
from door to door.
The amount of the bill which was al
lowed by the county to the trustee of
the poor for that district for the last
quarter would not feed the people, who
are starving, for two weeks. James B.
Toman, who is trustee Of the poor for
that district, deserves great credit for the
industrious way he has worked and the
splendid Judgment he has used in dis
tributing the funds. Many charitable
people who have friends in New Castle
that are needy, have been taking pro.
visions over to them to help to relieve
their sufferings.
Will RuiIl n New RrItOry