The Grit-advocate., 1900-07-06
IMMENSE FIRE AT
HOBOkEN DOCKS
Three Big Steamships Wholly Destroyed
With Great LOSS of Life.

jured and ut least | 800 lives imperiled
by II fire that started among cotton
bales under Pier No. 3, of the North
German Lloyd Steamship Company, in
Hoboken, \. j.. at 1 o'clock. Saturday
afternoon.
In less than fifteen minutes the
flames covered an area of Il quarter of
Il mile long. extending outward from
the actual short line to the bulk heads
from six hundred to one thousand feet
away, and had caught four great ocean
liners and II dOXen or more smaller
harbor craft in its grasp.
The losses sustained in the fire are
tonight cOnservatively placed at near
ly S1O.OOO.0OO. The loss of life merely
guess work ut even this late hour, will
reach probably as high as 200. and
there are over BOO men in the hospitals
in this city. Hobokcn and Jersey City,
badly burned.
Up to IA o'clock tonight eighteen
bodies have been recovered Eleven of
these We're placed in Il row at the
morgue in this city and We're number
ed. this being the only means the au-
thOrities have of maintaining any sort
of identity over the cOrpses, as they
are so badly charred and dismember-
ed that Identification will be made on
ly by trinkets or pieces of clothing that
We're found about the bodies. The on
ly way the steamship officials have of
approXimating the loss of life IS by
comparing the list of those reported
safe with the list of the employees on
the steamships.
a spectacular but horrible sight was
presented to-day Where two days ago
piers reached hundreds of feet out i'll
to the river and rose like great hills
alive with outgoing and incoming com
merce, lay Il great waste of burning
nd Smouldering beams, with here and
yhere a remnant of a high brick wall.
The three immense piers of the North
German Lloyd line We're burned to
til waters ripple, the Thingvalla pier
lay SmOuldcring and a part of the
Hamburg American pier which had
just been added to their great piers
We're ruins. Four large store houses
of the palmerCampbell company are
wrecked. and they. with the piers.went
TO make up the appalling mass of de-
brs, smoking. sizzling and steaming.
1t covers over four city blocks. and
reaches out into the river for over a
thousand feet. Streams of water are
being pumped upon the ruins and
workmen are poking about for bodies.
This was the scene of the greatest
attraction to-day and thousands upon
thousands of people went there The
streets We're iammed.
Far off. up the North river at Wee
hawken. a great cloud of smoke rose
and tumbled. ut one moment on the
water and the next rising just enough
TO show the skeletons of two Of the
great ocean liners. the Bremen and the
Maine. that rose like giant spires out
of the smooth face of the water. They
had been beached there. Around them
swarmed fleet of small boats carry
ing Sightseers.
Far down the river, off Ellis island,
lay the smoking and steaming hulk of
the Saale almost a total wreck.
The loss of life will probably prove
greatest when the wreck of the Saale
has been searched. Already Il number
of bodies have been taken off, and as
soon as the fire in the hold has subsid-
ed there is every possibility that many
bodies will be found below decks.
Various tugboat captains claim to
have seen thirty or forty persons in one
compartment just before the Saale
went down.
OF the 26G persons reported missing
tonight it is believed some will be
found in sailors boarding houses in
this city. Jersey City and IIoboken.
The North German Lloyd officials
deny that any passengers were lost, de-
cleare that few. if any. visitors perish
ed and that the loss of life was almost
entirely among employees of the com
pAny.