The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-01-11
NINE LOST IN HOTEL FIRE
DISASTER IN MINNEAPOLIS
 YESTERDAY MORNING.

Fire Captain Loses His Life While
 Saving That of Woman-Spring-
 field, Mass, Man SufTOcated in His
 ROOm--List of the Dead-Cause of
 Fire Unknown.
 Minneapolis, Jan. 1O.-Nine persons lost their lives in fire which burned out the fifth, sixth and seventh stories of the West hotel in this city this morning.
 The blaze started in an unknown manner in the packing room on the first floor. Ascending the elevator shaft it spread when 1t reached the fifth floor. Awakened by the ringing of the alarm bells in their rooms the guests, who numbered in all about seven hundred, rushed wildly about seeking safety. Those on the upper floors were driven back into their rooms by the smoke which filled the railways, and when the flremen arrived they were greeted by cries for assistance from scores of men and women, who, scantily clad, were shivering on the window ledges. Smoke was pouring out around them and soon two men were compelled to leap to avoid the flames. Both were killed. One of them has been identified as J. B. Peisinger, a travelling salesman from, New York. Miss M E. Hodges, a guest, sought fire escape, but having open ed the wrong window on the seventh floor, she was driven to step off the ledge. Her body was horribly man. gled. Death was instantaneous.
 Captain John Berwin, of hook and ladder company, having broken open a window on the seventh floor which he had reached by means of a sealing lad der, stumbled onto the body of Mrs Emeline Barlow, an aged woman. He strapped the unconscious form to his back and started down the ladder When midway between the seventh and sixth floors the strap broke. Bending over to balance the body for 8 moment, he then leaned, at the risk of his life and threw the woman toward a pro- jecting ledge on the floor below. Ap- parently being revived by the fresh air or by the shock, the aged woman grasped the projection and held on Later she was rescued. But in throw ing the woman to safety Captain Ber- win lost his balance and fell to the pavement. He was instantly killed. | J. F. Wolf, fifty-tive years old, trav- cling representative for Sperry & Alex ander, wholesale hardware merchants of New York, met horrible death. He was burned in his room and the condi- tion of the furniture indicated that he All the clohtig had been torn from the bed, and it was apparent that the man had sought to smother the flames which ieventuaily consumed him.
 Thomas Somerville, of Springfield, Mass, travelling salesman; W. c. Nichols, a grain commission merchant of Minneapolis, and Clinton Lamme, a travelling man from West Point, were suffocated in their rooms. Mrs. Barlow may die from inhaling smoke. A colored porter is reported missing.
 The property loss is estimated at $25, 900.
 The dead:
 Captain John Berwin, Hook and Lad der Company 1, killed by fall
 Thomas Somerville, Springfield, Mass, salesman for Atkins & Co.,, manufact- uring stationers Burnside, Conn, suf- located in his room on sixth floor.
 Alice Larson, servant, jumped from seventh floor
 w. c, Nichols, Chamber of Com merce, suffocated in his room.
 William Block, New York, travelling salesman for A. Tauze, wholesale jew eler, jumped from seventh floor.
 J. F. Wolf, northwestern salesman for Sperry & Alexander, New York burned to death in his room on seventh floor.
 Clinton Lamme, a West Point cadet on way to Bozeman, Mont, on fur tough, suffocated.
 Miss M. E. Hodges, Minneapolis, rep. resenting University Extension course jumped from seventh floor.
 J. B. Peisinger, New York, jumped into an alley.
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