The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1910-05-12
MACAzINEEXPLODES
Many Persons Killed and In
jured by Terrible Accident
at Ottawa
POWDER PLANT BLEW UP

Large Quantity OF Explosives Sc
OM by Flames Which Consumed
Part OF the Plant, Cause Death o.
Several Persons and Injury {,
Many MOre-TremendOus Force o
Explosion.
Ottawa, Ont, May SI-An explo.
sion which late this evening wreck.
ed the plant of the General Explo
sives Company of Canada, situated
mile from Hull, Quebec, and -four
miles from this city, killed between
te nand fifteen persons and injured
scores of others. The force of the
explosion was terrifying. The
country for miles around was laid
waste and many small dwellings in
the city of Hull, on the side nearest
the scene of the explosion were flat
tened to the ground.
A baseball game was in progress
a short distance from the powder
work about 6 o'clock this evening
The teams were playing the last in
nings and when a fire was seen in
one of the small buildings of the
powder plant the crowd began to
swarm upon the hill to get a better
view of the blaze. Warning of the
danger came to the onlookers in two
minor explosions soon after the fire
got well under way. A shower of
sparks and fragments of the wretch
ed building fell among the specta-
tors and there was a scurrying out
of what was considered the danger
zone. Some men in the crowd.
aware of the possibilities of the dan
ger when the main magazines were
reached by the flames, pleaded with
the crowd to go still farther back
and many of them needed the warn
ing. Others, apparently enjoying the
element of danger in the spectacle
stood within a thousand yards of the
burning buildings. They were kept
ON the qui vive by detonations which
sent showers of burning brands in
all directions. The baseball game
broke up and the remainder of the
spectators and the players rushed
up to join the crowd at the fire. 1t
was then that the main magazines
exploded There were two stunning
detonatiohs. Everything within a
radius of mile half was torn and
shattered. Giant trees were snapped
off close to the earth; barns and
dwelling houses were converted into
kindling wood and even in Ottawa,
four miles from the scene, hundreds
of plate glass windows were shat
tered to fragments.
The scene where the crowd from
the ball field stood resembeid bat
tlefield Headless, armless and leg
ess bodies were lying about among
scores of unconscious forms. To the
few who retained a flicker of con-
sciousness it appeared as though
over hundred had been killed. The
strange silence which followed the
final death dealing blast was more
terrifying than the cries and means
which came with a return to con-
seriousness of the badly injured.
At 10 o'clock tonight a police esti-
mate placed the number of dead at
fifteen and the injured at fifty.
Rideau Hall, the official home of
Earl Grey and the buildings on Par
lament hill caught the full force of
the explosion, being two miles nearer
the powder plant than the main sec
tion of the city. Every window on
one side of Rideau Hall was blown out
and two great stone chimneys top
pied over upon the roof of the build
ings.
Fragments of stone weighing up
to a half tone were shot through the
air for quarter of mile shattering
the frame dwellings of workingmen
which run to within an eighth of a
mile of the factory.
In home just north of the works
two sisters named Carrier, aged
and 19 were killed while sitting at
the supper table. John Blanchheld,
was sitting with his wife in the door
Vi lllS HOllt witch a liuSiiChe Va iON'N
snuffed out his life and left her un-
harmed but covered with blood.
The head of a lad named Fabien
was cut clean from his body.
Louis Mccain, laborer was
crushed by falling fragment. He
was taken in an automobile which
started hurridly for an Ottawa hos
pital. 1t was seen that he was dy-
ing. The automobile was stopped in
front of the Roman Catholic cathed-
raj and standing on the steps of the
edifice a priest administered the last
sacraments few minutes before he
died.
A little boy and girl, found dying
together, crushed beyond recognition
have not so far Abeen Identified.
Other victims are Ferdinand Laurin,
Antonio Carvaute, Joseph Bedard,
Horace Anderson and Albert Leblanc.