The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1915-08-07
Loaded to Capacity With Women
and Children the Excursion
Steamer Eastland Cap
sizes at Chicago.
THE CITY is APPALLED,
Thousands Search for Their Missing
Loved Ones States Attorney
Places Blame for Disaster on
U. S. Inspectors.

About a thousand persons lost
their lives in the Chicago river
Saturday, July "a, when the ex-
cursion steamer Eastland cap
sized. The ship was leaving its
wharf with more than 2,400 en-
ployes Of the Western Electric
Company, their relatives and
friends aboard, bound for a pleas
ure trip across Lake Michigan.
After working without a stop
all that day and through until
Sunday evening, the bodies of
more than 900 victims, mostly wo-
men and children, were taken
from the water by firemen and
policemen They were tagged for
Identification and removed from
temporary mOrgues to the Second
Regiment armory.
Taking into consideration esti-
mates of bodies thought to be in
the hold of the steamer lying on
its side in the river, Coroner Hoff-
man has said he believes that not
more than 1000 persons died in
the catastrophe.
The accident has stirred up a
scandal in the United States
steamboat inspection service A
rigid investigation has been
started. Secretary Redfield of
the Department of Commerce is
now in Chicago conducting, per-
sonally, the federal part Of the
probe.
Say Boat Was Topheavy.
The Eastland, said by marine archi-
tects to have been tOpheavy and bal
lasted in an uncertain manner, turned
over inside of five minutes after it
began to list. pouring its passengers
into the river or imprisOning them in
it's submerged hull.
Every effort was made by thousands
of persons on the wharf to rescue the
drowning men, women and children,
but many drowned almost within grasp
of the river bank. Mothers went to
death while their children were
snatched to safety Other children
died in the arms of their parents, who
were finally saved. Hundreds of girls,
1IOSQ 1OI q Ody 1AOIiA lAAC1A Ic1Sho VI
making telephone and other electrical
apparatus in the factory of the West
ern Electric Company, dressed in
their smartest white frocks, were
drowned
The EastIand lies on her side in the
river with divers still fioundering
through her CHASTITY interior while
Chicago, appalled,, is just beginning to
realize the real and terrible signifi-
canoe of one of the greatest of marine
disasters. While the thousands who
lost dear ones were walking through
the morgue in the Second Regiment
Armory, gazing into the faces of the
dead, half in hope, half in despair,
Chicago citizens and officials turn
ed their attention to the inveStiga-
tions that must bring forth some ex-
PLANTATION of the catastrophe and to
the work of providing relief for those
left destitute.
Kolen avenue, a small street near
the factory of the Western Electric
Company, is in universal mourning.
Every house lost from one to
all its occupants in the disaster. Many
of the ill-fated residents of this street
lay in the morgue, or beneath
the steel hull of the Eastland, over
which searchlights shot their binding
glare while hundreds of men searched
for more bodies Saturday night.
Blames U. S. inspectors.
In a formal statement issued States
Attorney Hoyne said regarding his in
vestigation of the cause OF the acci
dent:
I'VE insist that considerable share
of the blame for the Eastland disaster
rests upon the United States inspec
ton bureau. If the inspectors Of the
bureau had done their duty the acci
dent could not have occurred
I'VE know that the ship was con
sidered unsafe by the inspectors be
cause there are letters on file in Wash
ington which predicted Saturdays oc
currence. 1 have copies of these let
tiers and may introduce them before
the coroner's inquest"
Relief Funds Started.
Acting Mayor Moorehouse and hi
advisers at a meeting today decidet
to raise a relief fund of $500, 900 to b.
distributed by a subcommittee actin:
under the direction of the Nationa
Red Cross, the Associated Charitie
and the municipal health department
In addition to this the Western Elec
trio Company. whose employees forme
the vast majority of the Inflated e1
cursion party, has announced tina
100000 from its employees insuranc
funds is available for relief Man
private relief funds have been started
Says Frank Cannot Live.
Atlanta, Ca, July 26.-Leo
LSro1Ix,s dow. ORC Dnuohorod aooo-5i1