The Sentinel=record., 1911-03-26
l48 EMPLOYEES TRAPPED AMI
KILLED IN N, Y, FACTORY F|RE
her face and touched her wrist.
"She is Dead" he said.


The blanket ripped like cheese cloth
and her body was mangled almost be-
yond recognition. Another dropped
into tarpaulin held by three men.
Her weight tore 1t from their garsp
and she struck the street, breaking
almost every bone in her body. AL
most at the same time a man somer-
saulted down upon the shoulder of
policeman holding the tarpaulin He
glanced off, struck the sidewalk and
was picked up dead.
Within the building a man on the
eight floor stationed himself at the
door of one of the elevators and with
a club kept back the girls who had
stampeded to the wire cage. Thirty
We're admitted to the car at time.
They rushed down as fast as posi-
BILE
The call for ambulances was follow
ed by successive appeals for police un-
til 500 patrolmen arrived to cope with
a crowd numbering tens of thousands
Ia mixture of the morbidly curious
and of half crazed relatives and
friends of the victims. A hundred
mounted policemen had to charge the
crowd repeatedly to keep it back.
Led by Fire Chief Croker, squad
of firemen stormed the stairways and
gained access to the building at 7
O'Clock. Two searchlights from build
dngs opposite lighted the way of the
as they ascended to top
floors Fifty roasted bodies were found
on the ninth floor. They lay in every
possible posture, some so charred that
recognition was impossible. A half
dozen were nude, with the flesh hang
Ing In shreds to the bones.
Women with their hair burned
away, with here and there a limb
burned entirely off and the charred
stump visible, were lifted tenderIy
from the debris, wrapped in oil cloth
end lowered by pulleys to the street.
Across the street there rested on
the sidewalk a hundred pine coffins,
into which were placed the bodies. AS
fast as this was done the coffins were
carried away in any kind of vehicle
that could be pressed into service to
the morgue at Bellevue Hospital and
to the Charities Pier morgue, opened
for the first time since the Slocurn
horror
One hundred and six bodies had
been taken from the building and
twenty injured had been removed 10
st. Vincent Hospital at 10 o'clock. 0f
these, bore them down two flights 10
tance. Others were not expected 70
live through the night. Three of the
five women taken TO Bellevue Hospi-
tai died soon after admittance there
On the tenth floor of the building
adjoining the burning structure is the
law department of New York Univer-
sity. Here twenty odd students were
listening to lecture by Frank H.
Sommer, former sheriff OF Essex
county, New Jersey. He saw the
smoke and saw the girls trapped on
the roof. He led his class TO the roof
of the university quarters, where they
found two ladders The boys seized
these, bore then down two flights 70
the roof of an intervening building,
swarmed out of the windows and
raised them to the roof of the burn
ing structure. Forty girls were brought
down to safety.
IHyman Mescher. a cutter, slid down
the elevator cable ten stories and was
found alive at the bottom, standing
in water up to his arm pits. His
hands were lacerated, his forehead
was cut, but otherwise he was un-
hurt.
Just how many trips were made by
the elevator men. will probably never
be known There are many reports OF
heroism at the elevators, but 1t was
impossible tonight to learn il the lists
were operated to the last possible
moment.
City officials announced tonight
that the usual rigid investigation which
follow disaster will be instituted at
once Chief Croker said:
This calamity Is Just what | have
been predicting. There were no out
side fire escapes on this building.
have been advocating and asitattne
that fire escapes be put on buildings
|just such as this. This large loss o.
life is due to this neglect
The police say that today's fire 4
1.-THE sixth or seventh in the building
within twelve months. all OF which