The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1907-12-04
DIED in FIRE.
Thirteen People Burnt Up in a
Tenement Building Which
DEATH TRAP.

Flames Start in Saloon on Ground
Floor of a Four-Story Building
and Occupants are Driven to Top
Floor, Where Thirteen Are Burn.
ed or suffocated.-Police Suspect
Incendiarism.
|. Thirteen persons lost their lives
and several others were injured ear
~ Monday in a tenement house fire
at One Hundred and Ninth street and
Second avenue, New York. All the
dead were Italians. Seven of the
IL were children. The bodies were
found huddled together in rooms on
the top floor of the four-story build
ing, where the terror-stricken people,
had been driven by the flames, which
rushed up from the lower floors.
They had succumbed before thew
could reach windows which led to the
fire escapes. Some had been enyel-
eped in the flames and burned alive.
Others, overcome by smoke. were
spared the agonies of death n, the
flames.
That the fire was the work of in
cendiaries who sought evenge Is the
opinion of the police and fremen,
who made the first hasty examina-
ton. Three weeks ago three Italians
were caught in the act of attempting
to rob a safe in the saloon Of Guis-
eppe Cudano, on the ground floor.
The safe contained over $4,000,
which the saloon keepers friends
had withdrawn from banks during
the money panic. The would-be
robbers were arrested and are now
awaiting trial. The fire of Monday
started in Cudano's saloon and the
police believe it may have been the
work OF friends of the prisoners, who
took this means of squaring the ac-
count with the saloon keeper.
Cudano discovered the fire when
he went down to open his place of
business early Monday morning. AS
he opened the door he was met by
a rush of flames and without waiting
a moment to Investigate, dashed up
the stairs to the tenements above,
crying out for the occupants Of the
building to run for their lives. When
he reached the rooms occupied by his
own family he burst in the door and
Selling his young son in his arms
told Mrs. Cudano and other members
of the family to follow. Cudano and
the boy managed to find their way
down the stairs to the street, but be-
fore the oma could get through
the flames had cut off all exit.
Not a single person was seen to
appear at any of the windows Of The
blazing building with the exception
of those on the second floor. from
which several persons reached the
fire escapes and were rescued. After
the flames had been partially checked
fremen fought their way through the
smoke to the upper floors. There
they came upon piles of dead where
they had fallen victims to the rush
of flames and smoke v en before they
had a chance to attempt to a V
themselves.
In one of the heaps the firemen
found a woman who had made one
last desperate effort to save the life
of her baby v when she knew
that she herself was doomed to a hor-
rible death. She had folded her
arms tightly around the little one
and then huddled down close to the
floor, her body protecting that of the
child. The mothers body was badly
burned. That of the child bore
scarcely a mark but it was dead from
suffocation. On every side of the
mother and child lay the bodies Of
| other victims.