New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1920-06-02
Five Irisllnen
Win Over Death
In Blazing Hold
MacEvoy, Conlin, Corris,
Frey and Miriha Display
in Fight With Fire Pluck
That Made Erin Famous
Steamer PowhatanAhanle
Workers Trapped i'll Black
Darkness of Pit Escape
Through Shower of Sparks

Through Shower OF Sparks
This is the story of five men whom
FIRE and choking smoke and the terror
that walks in darkness could not whip.
Their names tell why-MacEvoy. Con-
lin, Corrs, Frey and Murtha -Ir an
men all.
With drill and rivet gun and acct
ylene torch they were at work yester-
day far down in the forehold of the
steamship Powhatan. She is laid up
for repair in the Morse Company
drydock at the foot of Fifty sixth
Street Brooklyn
Suddenly above the machine gun
,olatter Of the riveters came the cry of
Fire." A smoke, thick and black, was
drawn like a sliding door across She
hatch fifty feet above the heads of the
hold. near the hatchway, clambered
through to safety before red tongues
OF fame were mingled with the smoke.
Five Trapped in Hold
But down by the ships refrigerator
1rlshmen had no chance to get out un-
hurt. In fact. as they coughed and
wheezed in a darkness that grew ever
more strangling, they thought they had
little enough chance to get out at all.
Air was the crying need. and viii
liam Conlin, burner. Of 10,002 Fourth
Avenue. Brooklyn, turned up his
acetylene torch and, lying down on the
floor, where air was fresner started to
cut hole in the steel skin Of the
ship.
For a moment or two, his comrades
could see his torch shining through I've
murk. Then the smoke became SC
thick that it was blotted out.
the air was becoming so hot and
sitting that the four decided to Try
to run she gauntlet Of flames spouting
up through the hatch above, rather
than to strange to death in the bot
tom of the hold. They shouted for
Conlin, as we'll as their tortured lungs
would let them. They got no answer,
and, after cropping through the chok-
nor his torch, they started together
up the ladder that led through the
fire to the deck.
Sparks showered down on them.
Breathing became more and more
Of a perilous business. Under hands
and feet the rungs became hotter and
hotter. Still they climbed toward the
heart Of the fire
Firemen Knocked Out
They could never have made it, but
they were determined to try, the
fire or something broke the ladder
beneath them, splitting them all back
into the hold.
We all thought the same" Thomas
Murtha, riveter, of 46l Sixtieth Street
Brooklyn, said last night Eve didn't
think it much worth while trying
again
In the stygian blackness of the hold
they reached out and graspcd one an
other. 1t was q question Of slow
choking to death in the darkness or a
possible swift death in the fames.
Being Irish, they yearned for action,
so stumbling over to the side of the
ship, they began to climb toward the
hatch again over the framework.
Meanwhile engines lad come clang-
ing down to the drydock and iremen
had swarned on to the Powhatan, drag
ging hose lines VIII them. They
cut the men imprison d there. Five
Of them were knocked out by the
sitting smoke. They Wee taken to
the company's hospital.
Al length, on the blistcred faces of
the climbing four, there fell something
even more startling than the sparks
that had scared them. Water was
showering down upon them. A hose
from an engine outside had begun 10
play on the hatch.
Climb Through Waterfall
They who mad been climbing through
fire continued their upward struggl e
through & waterfall Under their hands
the iron was so hot that it steamed as
the water struck it. Then all at once
one of them reached cut and grasped
something, slung q leg over the hatcn
and staggered out of the black smoke
more blackened, tattered fcnds of the
pit followed him. The four were taker
70 the company's hospital.
Down in the hold, where the smoke
grew thicker by the moment, Conlir
still law on his stomach, watching the
fierce edge OF his cutting fame slice
through the steel OF the ship. He woY
prizes for cutting records during the
war did Conlin. He never did ia
job than yesterdays
Presently the plate fell out and {
little puff of pure. sweet ar reachec
Conlin's scared lungs. The way tc
freedom lay ahead OF MIN, but he Tic
not take it. Instead ne turned arounc
70 call his comrades, found they were
not there and started back into The
sitting blackness OF the mold to fine
them. He sought until he vas dizzy
ana thcn .ried 10 find the hole he hac
made He couldn't find that either.
Water splashing down on him gave
him courage and he followed the down
pour upward, and eventually tumblec
out Of the smoke cloud to collapse or
/ the deck
The Ere was eventually extinguishet
~ SINKING the dry dock and flooding
the hold
In adjoining beds in the company,
hospital last night the five men Of Ire
mad announced that they expected t
be back on the JOB TO- day.