Morris tribune., 1904-06-18
NUMBER OF PEOPLE STILL MISS.
ING PLACED AT FOUR HUN
DRED AND FIFTY.
BLOW FALLS ON ONE KEIGHB0RHOOD
PRACTICALLY EVERY VICTIM RE.
SIDED IN SMALL SECTION OF
EAST NEW YORK.

New York. June 17-When the
dread tale of the General Slocum dis
aster is fully told-when the last
blackened body has been taken from
the burned hull and the swift waters
of He'll Gate give up their dead-the
catastrophe will take it's place as the
most appalling that has ever occurred
In the inland waters of America. Def
mite figures on the loss of life cannot
yet be given. That more than 500
persons perished is a horrible GER
tainty, but how much in excess of that
number the total will run will only be
known when the missing" column is
finished.
At noon, according to the best OBJ
tainable information, about 450 per-
sons are reported to be missing. The
coroners Office, the chief of the fire
department and the police agree in the
estimate that the total loss of life will
closely approximate 1000.
All during the night and through the
early dawn the sad work of exploring
the Slocum's hull went on and from
dock to nlorgue the procession of an
balances, each with it's pitiful loaG,
wound it's way from the river front to
the morgue at the foot of TWenty-sixth
street, until at 2.3O p. m. 522 bodies
lay on the slabs.
Most OF these came from the wreck,
but the night long patrol of the waters
OF East river added. its CHASTITY quota.
There are many bodies still in the
hold Of the burned vessel, according
to the divers and Wreckers, but the
river is looked to to complete the list.
During Wednesday 2O3 persons were
taken to hospitals. After treatment it
was found iii many cases, that the in
jurieS were not serious enough to pre-
vent their going home and they wero
allowed to depart. Some of those who
remain in hospitals, however, are still
in a critical condition.
SEARCH FOR BODIES GOES
ON WITHOUT INTERRUPTION.
All through the night and up to the
present time men in diving suits and
Others with graphing hooks in their
hands stood on the decks OF tugs
which lowered about the sunken wreck
OF the General Slocum. Now and then
a man in one of the weird looking suits
would slip over the. side of a tug and
sink to the bottom. Then another
diver would appear on the surface.
Probably he had come to the surface
for rest and air or perhaps he held
the body OF a woman or the body of q
child in his rubber coated arms. The
chances We're that he had come up
with the dead.
AS diver would bring a body to the
surface graphing hook was placed
under it and it was raised to the deck
OF tug. Some of these bodies were
beyond recognition. When several
bodies were recovered another tug
from which divers were not working
would pull alongside and transfer the
dead. How many dead lie in that
charred ana sunken hull cannot ever
be estimated until every nook and
corner Of the shell has been gone over
by the divers.
Unlike the Iroquois theater and 9TH
er great cataStrOphes of recent years,
where the woe OF the disaster reached
throughout the land, the blow of the
Slocum's mortality falls practically
upon one little neighborhOod of a
great city. st. Marks parish, which |
furnished nearly every victim, lies |
within ten crowded blocks of the East
Side and there is hardly house there |
that is not ne of mourning.
The men ,ership of the little Lu- |
theIan chul ch is practically German, |
or of German descent, and all of the |
comparatively well-to-do class.
MANY DEEDS OF HEROlSM
TO BRIGHTEN SAD STORY.
The race of the burning steamer
from the moment the fire was discov-
cred until her bows crashed on the
shelving beach of North Brother isl
and lasted title more than ten min
utes, ye. that time SufT1ced for deedS
OF heroism which make the one bright
chapter in the heartrending story.
Brave men, devoted mothers and even
maidens and youths of tender years.
each contributed their part to the roll
OF heroic acts. There were rescues in
the face of almost certain death and
useless but exalted self-sacrifice. The
credit for the greatest saving of life
is due to the hardy tugboat men anu
other followers of the river, who
braved flames and held the noses of
their boats against the fire wrapped
steamer until driven off by the awful