Waterbury evening Democrat., 1903-06-01
TOPEKA SUBMERGED
One Hundred and Seventy
 Lives Lost.
FIRE ADDED TO HORRORS OF FLOOD
Victims RoOsted On Trees and House FOPs-The Worst Disaster the City aa1d Suburbs Have
 Ever ExDerfemce6.

dred houses have been burned, and the whole section of North Topeka seems doomed. The fire started from a live wire, and swirling floods prevent aid from reaching the stricken people. Burning houses are floating about, set ting fire to others. The lower stories of many burning buildings are filled with water, and no boat can approach any of them for the swift current. People are cooped up in their houses and cannot escape from the fire and flood.
 If there is no further rise in the river 1t is possible that many of the belea- guered people may be rescued. Boats have been telsgraphed for, and train load will arrive in a few hours from Ottawa and others from Emporia.
 It will be impossible before daylight extent of the damage. Almost super human efforts have been made to res cue those remaining, but the task has been too great for the facilities at hand. The current runs like a mill race down the principal streets. Even an expert oarsman can make no head way against it. West of Kansas ave nue the rescue of imprisoned people is probable. East of Kansas avenue it is an impossibility. A boat cannot be driven against the current. All day the rescuers worked, and people were landed by the hundreds, but it is a conservative estimate to say that there are a thousand people in the town who have not been rescued.
 There can be as yet no estimate of the number of lives offered as a sacri flee to the flood. The receding of the waters alone will reveal the worst there is to know, and even that will not show the maximum count, for the waters often bury their dead beyond human resurrection. With few ex- captions the names of those who suc-' cumbed are lacking. It is known only that babies were torn from the arms of their mothers to die in the waters and that men and women perished like rats in trap.
 It is impossible for the people liv- ing in security to realize the condi tions as they exist in the flooded dis trict. The people who lived in two AOWSSS ISlu6EO IO 1CdFS eACAA Saturday night with but few excep- tions, and on Sunday they would have been only too glad to leave their homes and all their valuab ables, but it was too late.
 The trip in a small boat around through Redmondvilie, Shorey and as far as Kansas avenue was as far as it was possible to go, as the current ran down all the cross streets with such force that no boat, however tight and manageable, could be made. to go far enough west to reach the landing. Sev- eral times the two men and their little craft were thrown against driftwood and houses with such force that the boat was in imminent danger of capsiz- ing.
 A conservative estimate of the num- Der of houses inhabited in the district thus traversed is one in every three. This is of the two story houses alone, as all the single story houses are standing in water to the caves, while in many places the water has risen to the floors in the second stories. About the houses the current of the river
 
 People roasted in the trees in almost all the blocks. Some were compelled to take refuge there because their homes had been destroyed and others because the houses were flooded so that it was no longer possible to live in them. In one place a man, his wife and six children were perched in a tree which looked hardly strong enough to sustain one person. The lit tie girls and the woman had been se- curely dashed to the tree by the man. There was no way in which this family could be relieved At the sight of boat they made frantic signals. From every window heads of water bound people were thrust forth, and each person endeavored to make more fran tic signs than the others. Little could be done for these people, as the means for getting them out were so meager. Tn some places where the rescuers went they found people sitting on the roofs of houses who refused to come down. They feared the danger of get ting into the boats more than they did their perilous positions on the house tops. Many of them were placed in Forbes elevator, and the Union Pa cihc depot was also used as a refuge station.
 Some of the larger houses and build ings near Shorey were not flooded se- riously, and many persons had been able to get to these before the flood had grown so bad. --
 One of the hardest working rescuers was pr. L. M. Powell. In the scow with him was L. l.. Kiene. Dr. Powell, MT. Kiene and two others were drawn by the shouts of a man on the roof of house. This man was rescued, and the party continued the journey. They found considerable dificulty in man. aging their boat and at the corner of Gordon and Van Buren anchored to a tree. Shortly afterward Dr. Powell was taken off in a skiff. MT. Kiene and Colonel Vanetta and the rescued man remained in the scow, and Dr. Powell reported that the party was safe whether brought off before morning or not. tr