Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1904-06-17
TERRIBLE SCENES
About the Wreck as Bodies of Dead
Are Recovered.

New York, June 16.-After an all
night search with the aid of profess
sional divers at North Brother island
for victims of the Inflated Gen. Slocum
which was burned, Wednesday, 463
known dead had been recovered up to
8 o'clock Thursday. OF this number
116 had been identified. The number
of missing is estimated in the vicinity
of 400. During the day, Wednesday,
203 people were taken to hospitals. At
ter treatment, it was found in many
cases that the injuries were not serious
enough to prevent their going home
and they were allowed to depart. Some
OF those who remain in hospitals, how
ever. are still in critical condition.
The center of interest in the Gen.
Slocum disaster, Wednesday night was
ut the morsue. All night long crowds
of people visited the building with en-
treaties for chance to try and make
identifications.
The estimates of the number of dead
given by officials vary exceedingly; DR..
Darlington, the president of the board
of health, who remained at North
Brother island for a great portion of
the night, gave us his estimate Il total
of 1900 with possibilities of 1850. In
spector Brooks who had been at the
scene since q few minutes after the
accident placed the number at nearly
| 1000.
A particularly sad incident during
the night was the attempt at suicide
of a grief stricken mother at the
y, This Mrc Rnl-
| anski of 337 Fifth street, went to the
| morgue to try to find her little daugh-
ter Wanda, who was missing and found
| body which she identified as that of
her child. Wandering from the morgue
she walked down the string piece of the
pier and attempted to throw herself
into the river. She had been watched,
however, and a policeman seized her
in time to save her life. She was taken
to Believer hospital.
All through the night and Thursday
men in diving suits, others with grap-
ping hooks, stood on the decks of tugs,
about the sunken wreck of the Gen.
Slocum. Now and then Il man in one
of the weird-looking suits would slip
over the side of tug and sink to the
bottom.
AS diver would bring a body to the
surface a graphing hook would be
placed under it and it would be raised
to the deck of tug. Some of these
| bodies were beyond recognition. When
several bodies were recovered they were
transferred to another tug and taken
| to imprOvised morgues.
How many dead lay in that charred
,pJ c,,plcn hull 20 nnot nvpp ha nSti-
mated until every nook and corner Of
the shell has been gone over by the
divers.
| At sunrise. Thursday, two divers
came to the surface. In the arms of one
| were two little girls clasped in each
others arms. Their hair was of the
same color and their dresses were alike,
indicating that they were sisters. The
other diver had in his arms the body
of young woman which had been
found with those of the little girls. In
her dead hand was still clasped the
| dress of one of the children and the
| divers thought that she was their
mother and had gone to death with
| them.
Brought into the Alexander avenue
police station and tagged as one of the
| identified dead, Clara Hartman was re-
| vived while she was lying in the inn
provised mOrgue. A woman searching
among the dead for a relative noticed
that the girl was breathing and called
an ambulance surgeon who found that
there were signs of life. After the sur
geon had worked over her for half an
hour she opened her eyes and she was
then hurried to the Lincoln hospital.
There it was found that the girl had
! been severely burned, but that she
might recover. She could remember
nothing of the awful events of the day.
The body of Miss Hartman was pick
| ed up by one of the fleet of rescuing
boats which already filled with a cargo
of dead. There being no space for the
body of Miss Hartman, it was fastened
to rope and towed astern or the
launch and was lifted to a pier on the
Manhattan side of the river.
On the wharf a man coming from
neighboring coal yard, carrying tar
paulin. wrapped Miss Hartman in the
sheet and helped to place her in line
wi. h the row of dead. One of the sew
eral vehicles pressed into service for the
transportation of the dead from the
docks to the station house. conveyed
Miss Hartman to the Alexander avenue
station where the unknown woman
made the discovery that life still ex-