Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1915-08-29
AMER|CUS MAN
STORM TOSSED
NEAR GALVESTON
TELLS EXPERIENCE IN RECENT
WEST INDIA STORM.

NAA' VII ESpey, IOFIueIly OIL Amer
icus but now residing in Galveston.
where he is engaged in the cotton
business, has written an interesting
letter to his sister, Mrs. John w. L.
Daniel, of this city, wherein he de-
scribes wildly his experiences during
the recent West India hurricane pre-
vailing there and which carried the
loss of scores of lives, besides a prop
erty loss of nearly fifteen million dol.
lars. This storm was more violent than
that which wrecked Galveston several
years ago
Mr. Espy's letter, in part, follows,
and will be read with interest by his
Americas friends:
Part of the Hotel Calvoz is only
fifty yards from the sea-wall and
Monday afternoon we gathered in the
front Of the building and saw what,
to- us was one of the most terribl..
sights we had ever witnessed No pen
can portray that awe-inspiring scene
of those mountainous pillows dashing
madly against the sea-wall and throw
ing water now forty and fifty feet
above the top and steadily getting
worse. The wind was blowing at the
rate of 80 miles an hour and the rain
was coming down in torrents.
Darkness came on and the electric
lights went off and also the water.
leaving us to huddle up in the lobby
around few Pickering rays of can
Gle light. AS the hours wore on to-
wards midnight we could feel the We
locity of the wind growing higher. The
water by this time was being driven
against the bottom of the hotel wall
and we could see the spray being
thrown up against the window panes
Some ofthe ladies were historical
and l along with the men were doing
what we could to cheer them up. It
seemed that at any moment part of the
and the water, so was told was now
in the hotel lobby The lady and her
daughter stayed by my side until )
O'Clock, at which time they eft to get
hotel might be blown or washed away,
some rest as l was sleeping.
BY morning the worst of the storm
had passed and by that afternoon peo-
pde were able to get around and view
the wrecks and ruins piled along the
beach front. Many remarkable things
We're to be seen, but among them all
the most striking sight to me fas
big two-story stone home with it's
front, both upstairs and DOWNSTAIRS,
battered to fragments by the great
slags and pieces of cement torn from
the cement walk behind the sea-wall
and hurled by the hurricane with VOL
ence against the walls.
The most remarkable thing which
happened was the washing away of
girl by the ocean from the Volacco
life saving station to Galveston Island,
distance of sixty miles. She was in
the water over twenty-four hours and
was picked up on the beach late Tues
day night unconscious, but has now re-
covered and is able to tell the story.
When asked how it happened that she
did not drown, she replied, THAT she
could never stand salt water and that
she kept her eyes and mouth tightly
closed and the pillows just carried her
along
| Several thousand bales of cotton
were blown through the water from
Galveston across the bay to the main
land and a soldier was carried by one
bale seven miles across the bay to
/ Texas City and picked I'D there Drac
tically nude, as the wind and waves
had torn his clothes away.
'The storm did great damage to
Houston and all towns in its path
through Oklahoma, Missouri and Illi-
nois. Up to now we have no lights |
nothing but drinking water, no street |
car nor railway service. The huge
cannery was mostly battered to !
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