Lower coast gazette., 1909-01-09
FEAR Of STARVATION AND DISEASE
Thousands of Bodies Lie in Ruins While
Numbers of Hungry Survivors of
Earthquake Throng Streets in
Vain Search for Food.

Rome-south Italy and the island of Sicily have been visited by an ap
pa1hng calamity the extent of which cannot yet be grasped. An earthquake
Monday wrecked city after city and oblterated smaller towns and villages with
out number.
Then a tidal wave swept along the Strait of Messina and added to the
pke the work of destruction.
Flames broke out in the devastated cities and countless numbers of wounded
men, women and children were burned to death.
The finest palaces, churches and theaers of Messna are heaps of ruins. Count
less dead bodies ares scattered through the wrekage md their decomposition will
doubtless bring pstHence o add to the horrors of the situation.
The devastation over the entire district was more or less complete. No part
of ths1noyjne of Reggie de Cahria escaped. The disturbance was most severe
along the sh0res of the Straits of Messina, where the cities of Mesdna and Reggie
are situated.
Rome-Teegrams from Geme Marina state that a squadron of warhips
has bombarded all tina. remains of Mesna in order to stop fires.
As mankind can do nothing against the work of nature, it only remains
to rm Messina to the ground in which the bodies of the dead will be forever
buried 70 me place where Messna once stood Will nus become a huge cemetery
Southern Italy and Sicily, these are but repetions of individual tragedies
already recorded. What chiefly concerns the government and people is the
progress that is being made toward the relief of those who have suffered by
the dreadful visitation Considerable advance in this respect has been made
at Messna, where, acc@dingsto official reports received here, the supply service
is beginning to work satisfactorily.
signor chmiri, a leading calabrian deputy, in an interview advises the
concentration of the injured at Naples and at Rome on the ground of the i'm.
possibility of accommodating them, as in 1905, near their W homes It is
me governments intention to remove all the survivors, possible to the various
ports Of Italy.
As a instance of his quick grasp of the situation, the king, soon after
his arrival a Mesdna, wired to Premier Gidett: "send ships and men; above
all, send ships loaded with quickime"
So far as has been possible quckime is used on the dead; man bodies
have been burned and other buried.
One feature of the disaster at Reggie is the large number of homeless
children. In son cases little babies were found creeping about in the ruins,
IND 1T seems impossible tt restore them to their parents, even if the parents
weea alive. A sailor who went ashore at Reggie relates that during his work
of rescue he vas attracted by a sound of infant voices. Looking under a aen
beam, he found twins about a year old in a basket.
In many eases survivors recovered consciousness to find themselves far away
from the scene' of the disaster. Large numbers of survivors have become insane
What has taken place at Reggie has been a REPETITION of the scenes at
Messina, but the proportion Of the population to perish at the former place is
higher. Today the conditions at Reggie are worse than at Messina, owing to
danger of epidemic from decomposMng bodies.
1t has been proposed in small villages where not q house remains standing
to set the debris o n fire as a means of publication.
Messna-The city is absolutely destroyed. The spectacle is a terrifying
one. The ruins aren now the prey of roaring flames. A great confagraton broke
out Immediately after the earthquake and devoured all that the earth shocks had
spared. Nearly the entire population is buried in the debris The latest cahula-
tions place the total number of survivors at only 10000. The dead at Messina
alone reach the stupendous figures Of nearly 100000.
Help from the outer world is at last beginning to reach the stricken city
The British cruiser Sntlej steamed in Wednesday from Malta and was followed
rouf. The officers and men of the two navies are giving every possible aid, yet
their task is a fearful one.
Under the peHing rain, in open air, hospitals are being installed in what were
once the streets Of the town. The sights IN every hand are so moving, SC tragic,
that it Is almost impossible to describe them adequately. The utmost depths of
anguish and suffering seem to have been sounded.
The entire garrison of Messma has persisted in the ruins, and people who
survive unhurt cannot escape from the vast smoudeing tomb in which their
knmen, wives, husbands parents and children lie The sea is closed to them
from want Of ships, and they are suffering the cruel extemiths Of hunger and
thirst. Here and there they ian be seen searching eagerly in the debris and
universal ruin for some mases to eat or for water to drink, but the heaps of
dust and debris yield them nothing.
At every turn some lmentabe scene meets the eyes. Men and women half
naked and terribly injured are imporng relief. The hospitals and chemists
shops have disappeared, and there are neither drugs nor surgical instruments at
hand.
In more than me town the shocks caused gas meters to explode, and dis
list.
I The CONFORMATION Of the Straits of Messina has been materially altered. The
tidal wave that completed the destructive work of the earth quake vas thirty
two feet high. i