The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-02-21
DEATH IN FLAMES
GUESTS WE'RE CONSUMED IN 4 NO.
TEL FIRE.
NINE LIVES WERE LOST.
MANY MORE WERE INJURED IN
ESCAPING.

Fire Burst Out without Warming in
the Clifton Hotel at Cedar Rapids,
IOwa-SeVenty or Eighty Guests in
the House Found Their Escape Cut
On-Were Driven to Jump-Frantic
Crowds i'm the Street watched the
Fearful Scenes-Y. NJ. c. A. Menu
bers Among the Victims.
Cedar Rapids. Ia. Feb 2O.-FYre ear
iy this morning destroyed the Clifton
Hotel, cremated nine of the guests,
and caused injuries to forty-two per-
sons. who were scorched or forced to
jump to the frozen street from second
and third-story windows.
After an all-day search in the debris,
four bodies have been recovered. 1t
is now believed that five more bodies
remain in the ruins of the hotel,
which is said to have been a fiimsy
structure and filled with delegates to
the State Y. NJ. c. A. Convention, and
the District Convention of the knights
of Pythias. Forty men have been
working in the rubbish all day and will
continue to dig for the remains of the
burned persons all night. The loss is
$50, 600
The dead are:
w. A. Mowery. What Cheer, la.
f. c. Young, Minneapolis.
Two unidentified men, bodies recov-
cred.
Five bodies still in debris.
Nearly all those injured were Iowa
people. While their injuries are Sc
we're in many cases. no one was fatal
ly hurt.
The work of learning the names of
the dead is rendered difficult by the
loss of the hotel register, which was
burned.
The hotel three-story brick struc-
ture, is said to have been a veritable
fire trap. The flames started in a pile
OF rubbish in the basement presuma-
bly, ignited by defective electric light
wires. The night clerk was on the
third floor when the cry of fire, raised
| by a bellboy startled him. He took
up the cry and in an instant the hall
ways were choked with frightened
guests.
| A rush was made for the stairways
1t was then that the crowd already
| collected in the street. heard heart
rending cries of anguish and despera-
ton, for the fire. feeding ravenously
on the tinder-like material of the low
er floor, had completely cut off escape.
Was n Mad Stampede.
There followed a stampede for the
windows, the only means of exist left.
The street below was filled with a
crowd scarcely less frantic than the
despairing ones in the fast burning
building.
The victims were literally driven by
the flames to jump. Nearly ever one
of them fingered to the last moment,
urged by the people below to wait as
long as possible i'm the hope of as
sistance. Then a cry would tell that
the fire had reached some one or the
smoke had made it impossible to
breathe, and one after another jumped
to the street, and some, more fortu-
nate, to the roofs of buildings ad-
joining.
In a short space of time the street
was filled with men and women bruis-
ed, battered, DfOken-l lmDed ana nAlf-
crazed. All were in their night gar
ments. In an hour ST. Luke's Hospital
contained fifteen injured. while many
more, chiefly those who had escaped
with comparatively slight hurts, We're
being cared for in buildings near the
scene of the tragedy. Some who jump
ed owe their lives to the fact that their
falls were broken by telegraph wires
which interposed in their downward
fight.
Stumbled Over Bodies.
A number OF the guests. who were
able to converse calmly following their
escape, declared that they stumbled
over PROSTATE bodies as they rushed
to the windows The flames literally
were chasing them. and the smoke
made 1t almost impossible to breathe
The proprietor of the hotel placed
his estimate of the number of people
in the building when the alarm was
raised at between seventy and eighty
Many of them were delegates to the
state convention of the Young Mems
Christian Association, which assem- bled
here yesterday. Those who were first
to escape, where they were not too
severely injured, stood for sometime
barefooted in the snow. chained to
the spot, and rendered unconscious of
the cold by the horror of the scene.
Many of them had to be led away.