Missouri Valley times. [volume] (Missouri Valley, Iowa) 1874-1931, 1900-07-05
Great FIRE
At HOBOKEN
Mammoth Steamship Docks and
Three Big Liners Are
Wiped Out.
TWO HUNDRED MAY HAVE persisted
Eighteen Bodies Have Been Re-
covered and Scores Of Per-
sons Are Missing.
LOSS WILL BE OVER $4,000, 900
LOSS WILL BE OVER s!o,ooo,ooo
The snale, Bremen and Main. De.
stroycd and Many of Those ON
Board Are Crcmated--.De-
tails of Coniiasration.

tails of Con1lasratiou.
New York, July 3.-Almost $10,0OO.-
ooo worth of property was destroyed,
many lives We're lost. many persons
We're injured and at least 1900 lives
were imperiled by ii fire that started
among cotton bales under pier three
OF the North German Lloyd Steamship
company in Hobokcn, N. j., at 4
o'clock Saturday afternoon. In less
than fifteen minutes the flames GOV.
cred an area more than a quarter of
mile long, extending outward from
the actual shore line TO the bulk
heads, from GOO to 1000 feet away and
had caught four great ocean liners
and dozen or more smaller harbor
craft in its grasp.
The hospitals in New York, Ho-
boken and Jersey City are crowded
with the injured and men are being
brought in by scores.
Those who gathered along the
shores of the Hudson river to witness
the great contlagration saw spec
taclc that they can never forget and
one that will always have conspicu-
Gus place in the history of New York.
While merely guess work at even
this late hour, the loss of life will
probably reach as high as 200, and
there are over 300 men in the hos
pitfalls in this city, Hobolsen and Jer-
sey City, badly burned. Up to IL
o'clock last night eighteen bodies had
ebeen recovered. Eleven of these were
placed in a row at the morgue, in this
city, and numbered, this being the
only means the authorities have of
maintaining any sort of identity of
the corpses, as they are SO badly
charred and dismembered that identi-
fication will be made only by trinkets
OF pieces of clothing that were found
about the bodies. The only way the
steamship officials have Of approx
mating the loss of life is by compar-
ing the list Of those reported safe
with the list of the employees on tho
steamships. Late last night Gustav
NSchwab, the general agent of the
North German Lloyd line. gave out a
list showing what men on each
vessel had been missing up to
that hour. On the saale 255 men
were employed and only 1877 of these
had been accounted for up to IL
O'clock, leaving 1928 men actually en-
ployed as officers. sailors, stewards, en-
gineers, coal passers, oilers and trim
mers to be accounted for. The Bre-
men had 2O4 men OH board but 127
of these have been found. The Main
had 49, employed on her at the time,
and of these only "a have been reports
ed safe.
Scene of the Fire.
The scene of the great fire today
presented spectacular but horrible
sight. Over in Hoboken, where two
days ago piers reached hundreds of
feet out into the river, and rising in
the air like great hills. stood alive
with outgoing and incoming COM
mcrce, q great waste of burning and
smouldering beams, with here and
there I, remnant of high brick wall,
are all that remains of the hundreds
of thousands of dollars worth Of prop
crty..
The three immense piers Of the
North German Lloyd line are burned
to the waters ripple, the Thingvalla
pier also is smouldering, and a part of
the Hamburg-American pier, which
had just been added to their great
piers, were in ruins. Four large store
houses of the Palmer-C Campbell COM
pany are wrecked and they, with the
piers, go to make up the appalling
mass Of debris that lies smoking, siz-
cling and steaming across the North
river 1t covers over four city blocks,
and reaches out into the river for over
1000 feet. Streams of wat.r are being
pumped onto the ruins and workmen
are polSing about among the hot
ruins for bodies or any traces of
bodies.
This was the scene of the greatest
attraction Sunday, and thousands up
on thousands of people went there.
The streets were damned with masses
going in steady streams to the ruins.
Every trolley car was packed with
struggling humanity; every ferry
boat was crowded to the rails and ev-
cry tug, too, brought into private use
had its quota of persons, hurrying to
the scene of the fire.
Skeletons Of Two Ltncrs.
Further off, up the North river at
Weehawllin, a great cloud of smoke
arose and tumbled, at one moment ly-
ing hard on the water and the next
rising just enough to show the skele-
tons of the two liners, the Bremen
and the Main, that rose like spires
from the smooth surface of the water.
They had been beached there. Around
them swarmed fleet of small boats
carrying spectators.
Far down the river, off Ellis island,
lay the smoking and steaming hulk of
the Saale. She was almosE a total
wreck.
The loss of life will probably nroye
greatest when the wreck of the Saale
has been searched Already num-
Der of bodies have been taken off her,
and as soon as the fire in her holds
has subsidized enough to allow any one
to go down in her, there is every pos
sibility that many bodies will be
found below decks, as various tugboat
captains claim to have seen thirty or