Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 June 1891 — THE YEAR OF FLAME. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

THE YEAR OF FLAME.

AWFUL DESTRUCTION BY FOREST FIRES. •JDie Fires of the Preseut Year Kecall the devastation of 1871—The Terrible Fate -salt Hefei Peshtigo, 11 is.—Vivid Description of the Scenes. Although the forest fires of the present •year in Mew Jersey, Michigan and Pennsylvania have doubtless destroyed nearly four million dollars’ worth of property, and swept two or three hundred poor families into the last ditch of destitution, besides costing several scores of Jives, yet these fires do not compare in disastrous results and horrible details with the fearful tornado of flame that swept both shores of Green Bay in 1871, .a year destined to bo known in history •as “The Yearof Flame,”by the simultaneous destruction of the city of Chicago and t.he great pine forests with their multitude of thriving towns and pioneer settlements. If these calamities had occurred separately instead of simultaneously, the impression ®made by each upon the public mind would have been tar more vivid and lasting. As it was, public attention was almost completely absorbed by the burning of Chicago, and the holocausts of the pineries, which entailed a much greater loss of life, were passed by with a tithe of the attention that they would have attracted had not the public eye been dazed by the mighty conflagration 4n the commercial capital of the West. When, also, it was true that the great •Chicago dailies were then homeless va-

grants, so to speak, and unable to .find half space enough in their columns to voice their own woes, it is small wonder that only meager accounts, entirely disproportioned in extent to the ■enormity of the disaster, are on record, •concerning the Wisconsin and Michigan fires. It seems as though the elements entered into a deliberate and calculating conspiracy to prepare for a great conflagration. From April until autumn the sun poured down upon this Northwestern country a fierce and steady flood of scorching rays, with hardly a single, .•shower or passing cloud to dim its awful” intensity. Not only were the crops withered and the forests parched but the very soil was baked to a crust more like peat fuel than fertile earth. Prudent men, who observed the times and seasons, felt a sense of impending •danger and took every precaution to provide for their own safety and that of their fellows, by avoiding the starting of ■any fire out of doors. But a few heedless persons did not observe this necessary caution and occasional clouds of smoko became visible over the great pine woods, from the decks of the vessels plying up and down the bay. It was an ill-omen and those who saw it shook their heads in sad apprehension. Gradually the volume of smoke increased and toward the latter part of September, the fires becamS general, and assumed formidable proportion-", threatening many little inland settlements with destruction. But their hardy inhabitants were used to “fighting fire,” and, once awakened to the so rful odds against them, doubled their diligence and for a time succeeded in averting destruction. But it was only a, temporary victory. From the remote

backwoods where it had its birth, the fire steadily and stealthily crept on towards the more populous towns near the coast. Among these was the prosperous little village of Peshtigo, on the Peshtigo River, where William B. Ogden of Chicago, had built the largest manufactury of “wooden ware” in this country, if not in the world, at that time. It contained two thousand inhabitants. On the 24th of September, according to contemporaneous accounts, the people of Peshtigo were called upon to make a stand against the flames that appeared in the surrounding timber. They made a heroic fight for hours, sometimes almost despairing, but again catching hope, as, one after anolner the columns of flame were beaten back. Victory finally rewarded their efforts and they returned it their homes to rest their weary bodies,

thankful that the long strain of anticipating danger was over: that they had met the enemy and conquered. How little they dreamed of the veritable baptism of fire that awaited them. Although a, pall of smoko still hung over

the woods on all sides of them, as the days worn on into October, the feeling of security in their hard-earned victory seemed to increase. One thoughtful man isaaid to have made a circuit of the town, carefully investigating all its surrounding ground, and pronounced the town safe. Every foot of the ground between the village and the timber seemed to bo clear of anything that could convey combustion. On Sunday evening, at the close of services in the churches, the sky, to the south, had an ominous brilliancy, and soon a distant roar became audible. Then a strong, hot wind, like the breath of a blast furnace, swept the town. This was the forerunner of the tornado of fire that was bearing down upon them with incredible speed and a power that uprooted trees.

So brief was the warning of the oncoming disaster that only a few of the inhabitants were aware of the doom that was enveloping them before it was fairly upon them. All printed accounts state that thero was but one version of the spectacle of the approaching fire given by survivors. They described it as a veritable tornado of fire, accompanied by a fearful roar. Dense clouds emitted metors of flame, and these firebaiis seemed to to burled at the buildings and people, as d'rectly as though from the mouths of be.-eiging cannon. This made the awful work of destruction very short, setting every building in the town ablaze almost as instantaneously as though ignited by an electric current. Many declared that points of flame seemed to strikeout at the panic-stricken people as they rushed from their dwellings and fled to the river. Only those fortunate enough to reach the river at the very onslaught escaped with their lives, and even a large portion of those perished. Some who reached the banks in time to have saved themselves had they immediately plunged into the water, thought to escape by crossing the bridge

to the opposite side. The bridge was in flames almost as soon as the dwellings, and as the crowd of crazed human beings attempted to surge across it the planking gave way and dropped them all into the river below, showering a volley of burning timbers upon them. Some seventy people, mostly women and children, took refuge in the largo brick quarters of the Peshtigo Company. They were all cremated as thoroughly as if treated by the most modern method known to the art. It is estimated that about three hundred succeeded in reaching the river, wedging themselves in between the logs of the timber boom that occupied the stream. The situation of even the most fortunate was terrible beyond conception. The water in which their bodies were immersed was bitterly cold, wh.le a maelstrom of scorching wind, burning fagots and bursting bricks beat down upon tho surface of the stream. The logs of tho boom of course ignited, and many of those who clung to them were compelled to release their grasp and sink for the last time—too much exhausted to secure another float. The terrors of the situation were greatly increased by tho fact that the cattle and horses in the place instinctively rushed into the water, dislodging scores of helpless people from their floats, crowding and trampling them down into the current. One family, it is said, made no attempt to escape to the r.ver, but quietly awaited death in their own home, fully believing that the iudgment day was at hand. Others, in whom the commercial spirit was strong even in the midst of such a holocaust, attempted to carry bundles of goods to the ter and were afterwards found, where they had fallen upon their faces with their packs upon their backs. Many plunged into wells, where they were roasted, like barbecued beeves, after the water in the wells had passed off into steam. Tho saddest incidents of that awful hour were the births and suicides, beverai women, under the terror of the moment, were called upon to endure the added agonies of childbirth, while suicides were numerous. One father quickly cut the throats of his three children and then took his own life. At least eight hundred people perished in Peshtigo, and three hundred in the Peshtigo sugar-bush district, a community of about, eight hundred inhabitants. The surfaces of the streams wore spotted with dead fish, while their beds were heaicd with the remains of deer, cattle,

horses, and men. Near oye stream was found a mother with her two children in her arms. One sugar-bush family, consisting of father, mother, and son, escaped by descending into their well aud each dashing water upon the others. At

Williamson’s Mill, a little sett'eraent of eighty inhabitants, the “barn boss,’’from an eminence saw tho fire-cloud coming, descended and tried to induco others to fleo with him to tho hardwood grove near By. They refused, and he mounted his horse and dashed through the oncoming flood of flame and reached tho hardwood timber in safety, while fifty-seven out of eighty of those behind perished. Forty-five charred bodies were found in the center of a large potato patch. Mrs. Williamson saved herself and son by tho use of

wet blankets. When she removed the wet covering from her face she found tho burned head of a dead woman resting on the edge of her blanket. One mother, with her fingers, scooped a

small trench in the earth and placed her little child in it and then laid down above it, to shield the child with her own body. Both perished. A l ough backwoodsman attempted to carry a sick friend to a stream, they died together. In less than five hours the fire swept a tract of country along Green Bay, forty miles In length and ten in breadth, causing a total direct loss of $5,000,000. The incidents of Feshtigo and Williamson's Mills were duplicated in scores of hamlets of Michigan av'i other portions of Wisconsin, and are most vividly brought to recollection by tho widespread and disastrous fires of 1891, in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wiscons n am? Minnesota.

HURRIED TO INSTANT FLIGHT.

SCENE AT THE PESHTIGO BRIDGE.

SAW THE FIRE CROUD COMING.

TAKING REFUGE IN THE FACTORY.