The Bemidji daily pioneer. [volume] (Bemidji, Minn.) 1904-1971, 1908-04-27

came to light when little OF the
Wreckage of the tornado in Louisiana,
Mississippi and Alabama had been
cleared away. The tornadoes lasted
altogether about twelve hours, strik-
ing promiscuously one town after the
other. Many hours after they struck
trains bearing nearly 200 injured came
crawling cautiously out of the tor
nado districts, leaving behind them
one town, Purvis, Miss, utterly de-
molished, five others practically blown
away and fifteen little villages in
more or less acute stages of ruin.
With these wounded came the details
of one of the worst wind disasters in
the history of the Gulf states.
First of all it became known that
negroes comprised most of the dead,
that the picturesque darby cabins,
noted for their fimsy, happy go lucky
construction. had been converted by
the wind into wholesale death traps.
It was in the fall of these cabins,
which went down almost without
warning, that most of the negro deaths
occurred. These always overcrowded
cabins also furnished most of the
badly wounded.
The identified white dead number
forty-two. The number of negroes
killed was between $50 and IT'S.
The towns which suffered the worst
damage, in addition to Purvis, were
Amite, La; McCallum, McLaurin and
Winchester, Miss, and Albertville,
Ala.
The following fifteen towns were
more or less damaged: Rtchland and
Lamourie, La; Wingate, New Angus
ia, Columbus, Walls, Braxton, Belle
Grove, Melton, Lorman, Pine Ridge,
Quitmans Landing, Fairchilds Creek
and Wahalak, Miss, and Bergen, Ala
Property Losses Not Large.
Most of these places are merely
collection of a few stores and dwell
iAgs, so that the property losses will
not reach very large figures. No esti-
mates of property damage have yet
been made, with the exception of
Amite, La, and Purvis, Miss, the two
worst sufferers where the damage,
which will never be estimated in the
aggregate, was done to timber lands,
to plantations and to railroad prop
erty scattered through a belt about
500 miles long,
The destruction Of Purvis, Miss,
was complete, in a few minutes time
OF about 200 dwelling houses only
seven were left standing. The court
house, the only other building in town
to Withstand the wind, was immedi-
Rtely packed with dead and injured
and served as the only available hos
pital within many miles.
Amite, La, was so badly damaged
that it was put under martial law by
order of its mayor. The storm killed
two white persons and thirteen ne
groes outright and injured many 9TH
ers, mostly negroes, so badly that
physicians say the total death list of
Amite would reach at least twenty
five. Rev. Father Felix Rumpf was
possibly the first person killed. He
was in the bell tower Of his church,
having just finished ringing the bell
He was crushed to death by the fall
ing tower
The path of the tornado was about
two and half miles wide and when
It had passed Amite stood a wreck.
Large numbers Of farm animals were
killed.
The greatest loss of life among me-
groes occurred in the vicinity of Nat
chez, Miss. In Concordia parish, La,
across the Mississippi from Natchez,
thirteen lives were lost, all except
two of the dead being negroes.
Twenty-Five persons were killed in
Adams county, Miss, near Natchez,
and thirty-fve we're killed in the
neighborhood Of Churchill. in Jeffer-
son county, Miss.