Carthage courier. (Carthage, Tenn.) 1913-current, 1921-04-28
YUBY DAM, U. S. A.
A CATASTROPHE


Probably the. worst catastrophe chat
has ever struck Yuby Dam or any
other damn place, since the sinking of
the Titanic, happened this morning
when the "Red Devil" Yuby Dam
whiskey schooner, plunged into the
"Jack Daniel" large fruit jar and
beer bottle ship on its way to Yuby
Dam, loaded with vessels to hold the
precious mountain dew.
The ''Red Devil" with Shimmy Tail
Thompson at the wheel and Wild Bill
Malone as captain, going at about a
forty mile clip, bore down on the
Jack Daniel" and struck her mid
ships, ramned a hole in her big
enough to turn the river through and
the terrible ram that was given the
Red Devil" tore off about twenty
feet of the bow and split her from
stem to stern, shook down the smoke
stacks on both vessels, put the pumps
out of commission and so demoralized
the crew that no one turned a hand
to save either vessel and both of them
sunk in about nine minutes in ninety
AoNiAOiAlS Ol WdLcE, carrying GOWN ali
the crew, with the fruit Jars, beer
bottles, kegs and barrels.
Everything was lost and everybody
was drowned but me. l am all the
one left to tell the tale, so you will
have to take what have to say about
it. For your benefit / will say that /
was right on the spot and got a
twlnkling view of the entire destruc-
ton of both vessels and am now tell
ing the world about it,
Skinny Tail Thompson" had taken
one too many, and Wild Bill Malone
had dwelled entirely too long over the
cups and had noticed for some time
that the "Red Devil" had been zigzag-
glng down stream, but everything
went well enough until we met the
"Jack Daniel" around a bend in the
river, coming up the stream. with
Bad William Till at the wheel, about
nine-tenths shot, taking both sides of
the river at once. had just taken
Bill Malone's place as master of the
boat, he having said to me that he
couldn't any longer see the banks and
that he didn't believe that there were
any, if so they both must be on the
side opposite from where he was look
ing for them or maybe both of them
on the same side of the river
| told him that they looked some
what dim to me but they were both
still there and the river was yet be-
tween them. About this time the col
hsion happened and the E'biler bust
ed" and | was worse added then than
ever for short minute until | came
to myself, standing head down about
sixty feet under the water. But by
buoyant force and cat-like action on
my part, / came back up into day
light and straddled a fifty three gal
lon barrel of white mule" and man
aged to keep above the water until
the ferry man at Fiddlers Green took
me out. The whole town has turned
out and we are making a desperate
effort to fish out all the liquor we
can today and after we have saved as
much of it as we possibly can we will
try to raise some of the crew.
understand just now, by wireless. that
the folks at Fiddlers Green, Blue Cut
Ruin, Lower Bill Town and other
points below have caught many float
ing barrels of this good whiskey and
that there is much rioting and rnuch
disorder at these places. Nearly
everybody has turned his ''wolf
loose" to such an extent at least that
the civil authorities can't cope with
the trouble and l am now fixing to
wire Gov. Taylor for the State
Police.
This is indeed bad jolt to Yuby
Dam. She has lost a good big part
of the very cream of her population
and many thouand of dollars worth of
fine stagger water.
The drunken
SLICKER SNAKE.
P. S. Anyone wishing to discuss
this calamity with me or hear of the
last words of their drowned relatives,
wait until about day after tomorrow.
am yet in stupor and somewhat
1aZed and can't yet unravel my mind
May good fortune attend you and
yours Billtown Whizzer.