The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1901-01-17
TRAMPLED TO DEATH
Men, Women and Children Lose
Their Lives In Theatre Panic.
CAUSED BY FALSE FIRE ALARM
List of Known Dead Is Seven,
While Many Others Are Miss
ing--Scene Was Appalling.

A Chicago special says: Seven
people were crushed to death and as
many more seriously injured in
panic which followed mans cry OF
sire" late Saturday afternoon in West
Twelfth street, Turner hall. About
eight hundred people were in the
place to witness the performance.
The play was "Yidish," and the au-
dience, comprised for the most part OF
women and children, was all Hebrews.
The hall stands in q district densely
populated by Jews. The play was
nearly over when the CRY, which
caused the panic, was raised, and
within five seconds after it rang
through the hall the entire audience
was converted into frantic mob,
every member of which was fighting
for the safety which lay beyond the
doors of the building.
The hall is frequently used for
dances, and when theatrical perform
auce is given chairs are set for the
spectators. As soon as the wild. rush
toward the doors began, chairs were
knocked down in every direction, the
aisles disappeared and the excited peo-
pie ran, climed and stumbled over the
chairs in their way toward the doors.
Around the upper part Of the hall
extends a balcony, which is open only
at one end. Here were seated 150
women and children, and the women
at the farther end Of the balcony, away
from the stairway, seeing that the rush
toward the exit was blocked to them
and their children, began at once to
throw the little ones over the railing
to the floor ten feet below.
The children fell into the midst of
the maddened throng and were at once
trampled under their feet. It is known
that three of the dead were children
who were thrown from the balcony
and were trampled by the crowd, with
not a chance for their lives. Follow
ing the children, many of the women
sprang from the balcony upon the
crowd, and others, swinging over,
hung by their hands before they drop
ped. The railing of the balcony was
broken through in half dozen places
by the pressure brought against by the
maddened crowd.
On the main floor the crush was
much worse than in the balcony. The
main exits from the hall, and only
ones known to a majority of those
who frequent the place, are two doors
in the south end of the main audito-
rum that open upon winding stairs,
which, eight steps down, unite into
one broader flight leading to the rain
door at the Twelfth street trout.
Around these two doors a frantic
mass of screaming men, women and
children were packed, all struggling
fercely to force their way down the
stairs. At the landing where the two
flights of stairs winding down from
the main hall unite woman stumbled
and fell. In an instant q score OF
people were down, and before the
rush was over four lives had been
crushed out in space four feet by six
feet long.
As soon as the news of the panic
had spread throughout the district,
which seemed but very few minutes,
all the Hebrews from that part OF the
city rushed to the place, bent upon
learning the names of the dead ard
wounded. Men and women fought
desperately with the officers in their
efforts to enter the building and learn
if any of their loved ones were among
the dead.
The alarm of fire was false, there
having been no blaze at any time.
The furnace in the building is some
what defective and at times allows
sparks to pass through the registers.
It was the sight of these sparks rising
into the room that frightened the man
who raised the cry of fire.
The hall has several times been the
scene of panics, and it is only few
months since a number of children
we're hurt in a rush for the doors,
which occurred during juvenile party
that was given in the place.