Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-11-09
FIVE DIE BY FIRE.
Mother and Children Overcome by
Smoke

dispatch from New York says: A
mother and four Of her children lost their
lives In fire which swept through the
crowded tenement house at S66 Madison
street. New York, yesterday afternoon. Had
1t not been for the quick work of the fire.
men in getting ladders to the windows many
more might have persisted.
The dead woman was Mrs. Mary Gins
pan, Jewess, thirty-flve years old, born in
Russia. Her children, whose charred bodies
were found near hers in the front hall of
the second floor, were Martel, a girl, aged
nine; Lizzie, seven years old; Sarah, aged
six, and Samuel, an infant of six months.
The woman's husband, Moritz Ginspan, is
a peddler. He was walking the streets at
the time Of the fire and did not know of the
catastrophe until late last evening, when he
returned to the house and found 1t dark
and dripping with water. He was crazed
with grief when he identified his wife and
children. He has four children sur, living.
About 4:30 o'clock Yesterday afternoon
girl broke into the rooms on the third floor
front of the house at o66 Maids IN street and
screamed "Fire!" Mrs. Louis Benowitz,
wife Of one Of the lessees of the building,
and her two children, Esther and Morris,
were there. Esther ran to the hall door
and opened it. Thick, sitting smoke poured
through from the hallway and stairs. Mrs
Benowitz gathered her children into her
arms and went out on the fire escape, while
the girl who had given warning ran down
the stairs and into the street shricking the
alarm.
While some of the fremen hurr Ell the
ladders up to the upper windows others
wrapped their coats about their faces and
plunged up the smOke-filled starways Fire
man James T. Daniels of Hook and Ladder
Truck reached the second flool hall way
by way of the stairs and stumbled over a
of foI
lying there at the side of the stairs, but
the girls was the only one that Sc Asuei TO
have life in it. Daniels fought his way
down through the smoke with Silver
Hospital ambulance surgeon soon restored
the girl to consciousness.
When Daniels and others went back to
bring out the other bodies In the hallway
they found that The flames had renche d
that point and they we're unable to go
higher than half way Up the staircase. AZ
ter the firemen mad fought back the fire
with the hose they went to the spot ana
there found the charred bodies of Mrs.
Ginspan and her children All of them
had probably been overcome with smoke
In trying to come down the stairs from
their rooms on the floor above. They may
have been dead when Daniels first stup.-
bled over their bodies and brought away the
body Of the girl who was still breathing.
Fireman Blush, driver for Chief Hayes,
brought Rebecca Randsburg out of the
flame and smoke on the third floor. Fire.
man Dixon went up the ladder to the third
floor when it was thought that all in the
building had been rescued, and after he
had been swallowed in smoke for many
minutes he appeared on the fire esca pc
landing with girl hanging unconscious
on his arm. She was Beckie Ginsburg and
she was so overcome by smoke that she had
to be sent to Gouverneur Hospital, where
she was revived after some effort.
Beckie Ginsburg. who had to be taken
to the hospital. and her brother Jacob,
neither Of them yet twelve years old, are
the sole survivors of a family of seven. A
little over year ago in the great tenement
fire at 1O5 Allen street their mother, father
two brothers and sister were caught in
their beds and burned to death. Since they
were orphaned the boy and girl are said
to have been living wherever they could
find cheap lodgings and working In sweat
shops