Waterbury evening Democrat., 1903-12-31

women and children. The fight for life
 which must have taken place at these
 two points is something that is simply,
 beyond human power adequately to de-
 scribe. Only a faint idea of it's horror
 could be derived from the aspect of the
 bodies as they lay. Women on top of
 these masses of dead had been over
 taken by death as they were crawling
 on their hands and knees over the bod
 ies of those who had died before.
 The bodies were in such an fnextrica.
 ble mass and so tightly were they jam
 med between the sides of the door and
 the walls that it was impossible to lift
 them one by one and carry thera out
 The only possible thing to do Eyas to seize limb or some other portion of the body and pull with main strength.
 Men worked at the task with tears run ming down their cheeks, and the sobs of the rescuers could be heard eveal in the hall below where this awful scene was being enacted A number of the men were compelled to abandon their task and give it over to others whose nerves had not as yet been shaken by the awful experience
 As one by one the bodies were drag ged out of the water soaked, blackened mass of corpses the spectacle became
 more and more heartrending. There were women whose clothing was torn completely from their bodies above the waist whose bosoms had been tram pied into pulp and whose faces were marred beyond identification.
 T.. a short time. and all it's equipment was not yet in place. This was unfortunate- ly the case with fire escape in the rear of the building. The small iron balconies to which the iron ladderx were to be attached were up. but the ladders had not yet been constructed.
 When the panic was at its height great number of women ran for these fire escapes, only to find as they emerged from the doorway upon the little iron platform that they were tIir- ty to fifty feet from the ground, a fire behind and no method of escape in front
 Those who reached the platform first endeavored to hold their footing and to keep back She crowd that pressed upon them from the rear. The effort was ut- terly useless. and in a few moments the. iron lodges were damned with crowds of women, who screamed. fought and tore at each other like ma niacs. This lasted but brief interval. and the rush from the interior of, the building became so violent that many of them were crowded of and fell to The rrrc mi Yor leaped from the platform, fracturinG legs and arms, and two were picked up at this point with fractured sIxulIs, having been killed instantly.
 Eddie Foy. principal comedian in the play, was one of the last to escape by getting out through rear door after assisting the women members Of the company to safety. He went into the Sherman House In his stage costume and with his face covered with grease paint in order to secure surgical at tendance for some burns which he had sustained. In describing the com of the fire Foy attributed the extent of the catastrophe to the failure of the hreproof curtain to work properly. Because of this, he said, the flames readily obtained access to the main part of the theater and were by the draft, carrying with it gas as we'll as fire, swept up to the two balconies, where the loss of life was greatest,
 The building in which the calamity stands midway between State and Dearborn streets on the north side of Randolph street. Although every available policeman within call of the was immediately hurried to the spot and the men placed in lines at the ends of the block, allowing no body to enter Randolph street from ei- ther Dearborn or State street, it was found for time almost impossible to hold back the frenzied crowd that pressed forward, many of them having friends or relatives in the theater and anxious to learn something of them.
 Although all the patrol wagons and every ambulance owned by the city was pressed into service, they were utterly inadequate to carry away the dead, and in short time there was a line of corpses fifty feet long piled two and three feet high on the sidewalk in front of the theater. It was found nec- essary in order to convey the bodies rapidly to the morgue and to the vari- ous undertaking establishments to press trucks into service, and an these upon costly blankets furnished by the dry goods stores in the vicinity and covered with the same material the dead were hauled away practically like 30 much cordwood.
 MT. Edward Butler, who escaped from the burning theater and after ward saved a lot of lives, said:
 We caught hold of the handles of gallery exit door and managed to break It open Piled up five feet deep by the door were dead and dying human be- lngs. I grabbed hold of an arm, and he burned skin peeled off in my hands. The smoke was suffocating, and the heat was terrific.
 s'I pulled out one girl whose hand was burned to a crisp clear to the el, DOW. It seemed as if they were all lit