Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1908-08-04
FERhiE, B. c, IS COMPLETELY
WIPED OUT AND FIVE OTHER
TOWNS ARE PARTIALLY DE
sTRoYED BY THE FLAMES.
PROPERTY LOSS
WILL BE $4,5oo,0oO
ONE HUNDRED SQUARE MILES OF.
COUNTRY ABLAZE AND RE.
FuGEEs ARE STARVING TO
DEATH IN THE VALLEYS.

Winnipeg, Aug. s.-The latest
estimates OF dead in the Elk river
!. district by the brush fires which
have been ranging for a month
from Michel to Fernie is one hun
/ dred and fifty persons. The prop
perty loss is $5,000,0o0 in Fernie.
Six thousand persons among that
city's inhabitants are homeless.
The residents have been taken
by trains to places OF safety and
are now destitute.
Thousands of dollars have been
sent by western Canadian cities
this morning to the relief of the
destitute. Medical supplies are
greatly needed. Fernie with it's
lumber mills and railway termi-
( nails is wiped out. The fire is still
raging around Hosmer and Spar
wood but Michel is safe, the wind
dying out at midnight. If a gale
springs up that city will be again
. in danger soo1l. Seventy men in
camps of the Elk River company
perished.
Iowa Lumberman In Camp.
Chicago, Aug. Be. w. Stees,
of Caron, B. c., who has exten-
sive interests there and at Fernie
is in the city today. He declares
he had received information from
Winnipeg to the effect that 80
lumbermen, employed by the Elk
Z Lumber company at Fernie had
lost their lives.
Stees said that Peter J. Seip-
pei of Dubuque, Iowa, and H. D.
Campbell of Saltwater, Mimi,
both Of whom are actively in
terested in the lumber trade, we're
at Fernie with their families for
the summer and he believes from
printed accounts of the disaster
that they must have lost their
lives. Stees declares the Eastern
British Lumber company, with
which he is connected, has lost
Its plant and about fifty million
feet of lumber at Fernie.
Cranbrook, B. c., Aug. 3.-Nin
owns on the Crows Nest branch {
he Canadian Pacific railroad hav
been wiped out and many others al
n danger Of destruction by the fer
,st forest fires ever known in Wester
Canada.
One hundred lives are known
nave been lost, hundreds have bee
INJURED and the monetary loss runs Il
o the millions.
Both the Canadian Pacific and Gres
Northern railroads have been bad
crippled in the territory affected, an
is telegraphic communication is a
most entirely interrupted, it is ir
possible at this time to obtain def1ni1
figures as to loss of life and propert
The fire is raging in the Elk va
ey, the richest coal and lumber di
.rict in British Columbia. 1t is in, I'll
extreme southeastern corner of tt
province, just north of the Montar
state line.
These Towns Destroyed.
The towns known to have been d
stroyed with their populations are
Fernie, 5000; Michel, 1900; Co
Creek, 1900; Sparwood, 200; Elk
400; Olsen, 1870; 4Morrissey, 800, Ho
mer, 400; McGillivray, 100.
Cranbrook itself has suffered
property loss of .2,0Oo,OOO and its i
habitants are dividing their efforts b
tween brave attempt to save the
own town and heroic measures to su
cor surrounding communities.
+ One hundred square miles have {
ready been swept by the flames al
it is feared that scores of homestea
ers have met death in the deep wood
Z For the past week bush fires ha'
been raging between Fernie al
Michel, but the inhabitants paid litt
to them, beyond deplorir
the great damage to growing timber
Yesterday, famed by a gale fro
the northwest the flames swept eas
ward and soon it was seen that Fer
lie was doomed.
The residents appelaed to the Ca
adian Pacific railroad for help al
special trains were rushed to tt