The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-01-29
EXPLOSION NEAR LONDON WRECKED
 TOWN, IS REPORT
Returning Tourists Say Ter. rifle Blast Centered In
 Chemical Plant.

New York, Jan. 29.-First accounts, other than censored cable dispatches, of the great explosion that shook London on Jan. 19 were brought here yesterday by passengers on the Amer lean liner St. Louis, which arrived from Liverpool. Several of them were in London at the time.
 Woolwich the British government arsenal, was not the scene of the dis aster, as many were at first led ito be- leve. It occurred in a. chemical plant at Silvertown,s on the Thames, eight miles from the heart of London, where high explosives were being made for use in the trenches. The entire town was wiped out, and that more lives were not lost was due, to~the' fact thai the explosion was the result of fire that burned first for half an hour. :. When the fire started there was a general exodus from the town in every available conveyance and on foot, employees and their families flee ing for their lives. About 400 who had not gone far enough away from the scene were injured by flying debris, and more than 100 employees who re- maineds and endeavored to sm6ther the flames were blown to atoms.
 London was rocked as if by an earthquake, and windows were broken 12 miles away from the explosion, or as far from Black Tom as Dyckman street.
 London Reports Censored.
 The London papers were permitted to print only a few lines, announcing that there had been an explosion, without stating even where it oc- cured. When the St. Louis sailed, the following day, there were reports that the damage to London buildings had been great.
 John A. Wilson of Franklin. Pa., cousin of President Wilson, who was a passenger, said he was dining at the Great Eastern Hotel, in Liverpool street, with Henry Thornton, former general superintendent of the Long Island Railroad, and now general manager of the Great Eastern Rail- way. He said Sthat the explosion shook the hotel, and MT. Thornton. 1mme ediatelX- set the railroad wires at work to locate it.
 He received word that it was seven miles out on the line, in the chemical works; that the whole town had been wiped out, and that there was great loss of life. which would have been far greater had not most of the peo- pie fled when the fire started. ss D. IL. Wadsworth, sales manager of the Lakewood Engineering Company of Cleveland, who was abroad selling trench railways to the French govern ment, said he was dining at the Ho- tel Savoy. The windows in the hotel caved in under the concussion, he said, being blown from their castings, and nearly every one in the hotel rushed to the street. There was a great flare/ in the sky and it was thought that a Zeppelin had dropped bomb on the hotel:
 Plant Run by Government
 MT. Wadsworth said he was told son good authority that the chemical works had been established by the government in the plant of the Sill. vertow Cord Tire Company.
 Gen. James Mason of the Canadian forces was at dinner in the. Junior Army and Navy Club, near the War Office. He said the building trembled and the belief there was that Zeppe- Ans were making a raid.
 w. S.. Dewey, who is in the oil bus fness at Tulsa, Okla, and is dis tant relative of the late Admiral Dewey, said he was in a taxi going from the Cecil to Picadilly Circus, and he described the concussion as tremendous. He said that all of Lon don was shaken and that the suppress sion of the location to a belief that the explosion was at Woo1wich Ar senal.
 Other passengers said people rush ed to the streets in all parts of Lon don, fearing their homes would 'tum- ble down on them.