The sun., 1903-12-28
FOUGHT A FIRE SEVEN HOURS.
EARLY MORNING DLAZE IN A
BACHELOR APARTMENT.
House Where A,onzo Potter and Others
Lived WreckedTwo Negro Hallboys
Hurt-Criticsm OF Departments
Work Not Fair, Says chief Duane.

Lived WreCked-TW0 negro HshOO!s
Hurt-Criticism Of Departments
Work Not Fair. Says chief Duane.
The fire in the bachelor apartment house
at 80 West Thirt y-sixth street early yester-
day morning kept the firemen at work for
seven hours and every dweller on the block
awake all OF the night. The 1hirty-si1th
street house is a five story narrow brown
stone front building which Mrs. Daniel f..
Tuttle leases
Her tenants are all well-to-do men and
among them are Alonzo Potter. nephew
Of Bishop Potter; DR.. j. H. Claiborne. an
oculist Andrew A. Bbby, a real estate
broker. and Carstan Boe. There are six
other men tenants in the building.
Mrs. Tuttle manages three other houses
on the block and she makes her home at 20.
The bachelor apartments are left at night
in charge Of two negro hallboys and the
negro laundress. The halboys sleep on
the top floor and the laundress in the base
ment.
Most of Mrs. Tuttle's tenants were out
OF town for the holidays. and apparently
the only one who stayed in town was Mr..
Boe. He spent most of Saturday evening
at the Waldorf and it was after midnight
when he started for his apartment. He
was climbing the at airs to his apartment on
the second floor when the colored laundress
ran up from the basement yelling Fire y
Mr.. Boe started to run up stairs to arouse
the other tenants, but when he reached
the second landing the entire upper part
of the building was in flames. lie darted
downstairs again and reached the front
door Just as the first stairs fell in behind
him.
Deputy Chief Duane was one OF the first
arrivals, his headquarters being only three
gone and the upper part of the building
blazing, the fire had to be fought from the
street and the housetops on either side
| Of 1t.
A few minutes before the firemen came
! the two legroes asleep on the top floor
escape, and going through the adjoining
| house reached back yard, They were
so frightened that in climbing the fence
| Of a Thirty y-seventh street house they fell.
Both were SO badly bruised that they were
sent to the New York Hospital.
| The f1remen were at work an hour before
| the water they poured into the building
had any apparent effect. At O'Clock the
flames broke out afresh from the top floor.
From that. on until . o'cloclr. the fireInen
worked. Folks In the street seemed to
think that the fire was badly handled.
When the fremen stopped work at I
clock yesterday morning the interior
OF the building was Il wreck. Then all the
plaster and woodwo ork that hadn't been
burned out was chopped out in a search for
hidden flames.
The firemen estimated the loss on the
building at $4,000, but the loss Of the occu-
pants will probably amount to three times
that amount. A nephew of DR.. Claiborne
said yesterday that the oculist's loss would
be SIS 900, as all his Instruments were de-
stroyed DR. Claiborne occupied the frst
floor.
Chief Duane said yesterday that there
was no cause for criticism in the way the
fire was managed. He said it was burning
for fully an hour when the alarm was rung
in and that when he arrived the building
was furnace.
For time it was thought that some OF
building, and a search was made for bodies.
The two negro hallboys say that Mr.. Boe
was the only tenant in town.