The evening times., 1900-09-17
THE GALVESTON HORROR
4 Correspondent Describes the
Frightful Scenes in Texas.
Death and Devastation in the Wreck
ed Island City-Coast strewn With
the Debris of Thousands of Homes
The Grevsome Work of Burying
Those Killed by the Terrible Storm

AUSTIN, Texas, Sept I7.-CoL William
Sterrett, of the Galveston and Dallas
News went to Galveston after the storm
and the sights he saw during his stay
there are thus described by him:
How to commence the story bothers
Whether to start out with the absolute
truth and wind the sheet about the whole
thing with the simple expression 'un-
speakabie' or to go on and hint the de-
tails inexpressibIy sad, intimate the hor-
rors is the question.
ut would be better for the heart if q
veil could fail from heaven and conceal
what it has done. 1t would be better if a
fog thick like wall should come up be-
tween the sea and the land that the lat
ter might never see the crime of the for
mer, For if calm humanity shrieked
against the awfuIness of the one element,
it has done it now.
The broad pampa between Houston and
Galveston has been flooded. The towns
which in the past ten years had grown
were SCARED and torn by this fend. It's
anger was shown in pastures as we'll
III towns, and yet none knew the fury of
it. There were REPORTS of destruction
further on. and the truth OF them i'm
pressed each man in the cars as the cars
counted off its rattlete1eck in tolliHg off
the miles,
Against barbed wire fence the bIoated
carcasses of cattle had fioated, their swol-
len limbs stiff toward the sky, and yet
others browsed around in the meadow now
which was roaring sea but four days ago.
The sight ba fire E.n af
and every man in the car as TO avoid the
fear that arose in the mind of each began
to express wonder how this could be-that
IS. thgt some of these poor brutes were
dead and others living. There were vessels
of all tonnage, kinds. and degrees on the
prairie.
Out there was . tramp steamship, the
other way vas the dredge boat: there were
yachts. sch0opers, and launches but near
as was the hobby horse OF d child. And SO
help me, / would rather have seen all the
vessels of the earth stranded high and dry
than to have seen this child toy. standing
right out on that prairie. masterless. Be
cause one represented-WeH why, say
God. mans heart IS 50 weak. But surels
n will forgive it when it is soft for those
who are weak
Debris of all kinds covered the prairie
1t was from Galveston because il could be
from no other place Every ant hill was
covered with the remnants of homes in the
city six miles away There were lace eur
tains. furniture of all kinds but mostly of
the cheap kind. There were toys. ladies'
toilet articles, bed clothes, and in fact
everything that goes to make UP home
This point was Texas City, six miles away
from Galveston, across the bay.
The town had suffered badly
Human lives were lost there. and the
agony OF it was great. but above all was
the idea What of across the bay?' II
was six miles dead across and IA schooner
Was in waiting To take us over. But be
fore il landed there WAS a chance of OBJ
servation of the bay. on which the aters
now gently Iisped. Fer The bay VS. as
gentle a country pond II lisped ana
kissed the few blades of grass that grew
down where the rise and fall of the ridge
Was natural 1t did not moan like the sea
II merely surgled. Bur every little wave
threw up and agjtated the dead. Bleated
horses and COWS which proVideut house
keepers in the city across the water had
owned and petted were there Chickens
rats, dogs, eats. and every hing, 1t seemed
that breathed. was there, dead and swollen
and making the air nauseous.
But by their sides were people The
worn-eut people of the district having
saved their own lives and buried their
dead. were quick 10 respond to natural in
stincts and do right by their kind | saw
them take swollen women and swollen men
and swollen children and With quick shift
place them in two-foot graves. II was ter
rible. but what could they 10?
There were 10 burial services The
men who did the work were simply doing
what they could to relieve the air of them
They were not gentle, but now could they
be gentle when the bodies lay there with
their black faces, with their terribly
/ swollen tongues and the 0dor of deeon:-
position threatening these who Iived2
In the debris from GaIvsstog WAS every
thing. I was struck with tiSh idea that
this must have impressed the people that
the world had come 10 an end For twen-
ty-fve miles on the Ialid into the interior
this disorderly element ragged It destroy
ed and ii mangIed and when il ceased
really the sea had given UP It's dead and
the secrets OF life were revealed. for walk
ing among the debris I found e trunk. II
had been broken open by the violence OF
the waves.
Letters were blurred by the waves.
picked up one, and il began, My darling
little wife" p" and I closed it and threw it
among its fellows on the drift. She was
dead She had kept this letter. Their sa-
cred relations were exposed by this terror
to those who would read them There were
dozens of men VINO picked up those letters
No one read them. for a man is not so bad
after all.
Two women talked to them-had left
two children each in Galveston in the de-
stroyed district, and they sat through that
whole five hours trip wringing their hands
and trying to curb the volcano of Iamenta-
ton which lies in the mothers heart when
those of her flesh are imperiled or dead.
We passed corpses. We passed the
corpses of men and women and children
The moon was out, floating real brilliantly
and the boat cut past barely missing a
woman with her face turned toward God
and the sky I fervently prayed / might
never see the like again. And when We
reached the wharf, torn aud skinned so that
We had to creep to land I saw beneath me-
white and naked. seven bodies.
My very soul turned cold at the grew
some sight. Horriblei The contemplation
of it yet makes me sick though 1 have
seen things since then that make me and
would make the world sick, if / were able
10 describe them unto DEATH
Believed to Have Drowned.
PA1.TTAIORE