Jasper County Democrat, Volume 1, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 March 1899 — DIE IN HOTEL FIRE. [ARTICLE]

DIE IN HOTEL FIRE.

GUESTS ARE CAUGHT IN A DEATH TRAP. Nearly a Fcore Killed— Windtor Hotel in New Yqrk Is Completely Con-antncd-Wild r'ceues of ExcitementCause of the Holocaust. The Windsor Hotel in New Y’ork caught fire in some unknown way at 3:10 o'clock Friday afternoon. Within an hour the building was a glowing shell of shattered walls. Fifteen persons were dead as the result. Forty-three, variously injured, were at the hospitals. The bodies of many more were buried in the smoldering ruins. From the i'oof and windows, from the fire escapes and 'cornices, frenzied men and Women threw’ themselves to the pavement five, six, seven stories below. Bewildered guests within the roaring furnace were carried down to death by falling, walls, and all the while 50,000 human beings watched the tragedy. Massed into solid lines, men and women filled side streets, avenues and doorsteps, there to watch the parade of the day, but fated to witness the most giewsome fire New York has ever known. The roll of dead is long. Private homes around the place of sacrifice became field hospitals—spacious mansions, including the Jay Gould home, wore made temporary morgues. John Foy, a waiter employed at the Windsor Hotel, in a statement made after the fire to Coroner Bausch declared that the hotel was burned through the gross carelessness of a guest. The waiter was in a corridor of the second floor, walking, toward 47th street, when he saw a man near the end of the corridor strike a match to light his cigar. The man threw the match to the floor and walked on without waiting to see that it had gone out. Foy noticed the action, and be also noticed that the match was still blazing when it left the man’s hand. When the waiter reached the spot the lace curtains were ablaze. He tried to extinguish the flame, but it' was quickly up the curtain and caught the woodwork. The carpet caught fire, and th£ walls seemed to burn like tinder. Foy gave the alarm and ran down stairs and out of the building to reach a firebox. An hour after the fire started the nun was complete. At ten minutes after 3 o'clock the head of the parade reached 441 th street and Fifth avenue, opposite the Windsor. An instant later a policeman saw a tiny blaze and a puff of smoke in a bow window in the drawing room on the second floor, on the 40th street side. He turned in an alarm. Before he could return to the hotel the drawing room was a sheet of flames. The room had been crowded with guests watching the parade. When the curtain ignited—for that is said to have been the start of the tire—instant panic came over all. Men and women fled to the stairways and the flames leaped after them. Up the stairs and elevators sped the guests—up air and light shafts raced the flames. In an incredibly short time the whole building was enveloped in dull, roaring tongues of tire, and heavy stifling smoke. It seems as if the fire must have been burning under the floor and in the walls, for on no other hyiwthesis can the suddenness of its spreading be accounted for. The. width of the corridors made it easy to run, and the guests filled them in their rush for the streets. The elevators, although they were run until aflame, brought comparatively few down in safety. The road out of the death trap was down the splendid marble stairs. And down those stairs poured a terrified procession.

Meanwhile through the tangled mob outside the fire engines had forced their way. It was after the first wild rush that swept so many to safety down the broad staircase that the most awful events of the great fire occurred. All of the women had not sprung from their rooms with the first alarm. Some had stopped to dress, some to gather their most precious belongings. And these were doomed. Thon. too. there were sick persons in the house, bedridden men aud women. When these belated ones got into the corridors they were for the most part bounded by walls of fire. Up the great central well roared the flames. Right at the stairways, the logical aud accustomed avenues to the streets, were the terrible, sentries, curling and swirling with threats to all who dared to pass that dread picket line. Then these belated guests took to the fire escapes, throwing open windows and reaching their arms out to the sea of people who groaned below. Many of those who came to the windows were saved at last by daring firemen and citizens. But the fire was too swift, the time too short. While the firemen were helping some to safety, others felt the touch of the red hand upon them from behind, and threw themselves from the windows. The fircmep displayed the utmost heroism and daring in saving life at the most imminent risk. The Windsor was the resort and dwelling place of rich people, and there may have been half a million dollars’ worth of jewels alone lost by the women who lived there. Among the dead are the wires of millionaires, aS well as the maids, who were shut off in the top story. Abner McKinley, brother of the President of the United States, with his wife and daughter, Miss Mabel McKinley, occupied a suite of rooms on the ground floor of the hotel. Among the dead are Mrs. Warren Leland, wife of the Windsor’s proprietor, and her daughter. Miss Helen Leland, and Mrs. James S. Kirk, widow of the millionaire soap manufacturer of Chicago. The loss on the hotel is estimated at about $1,000,000. Several adjoining buildings were damaged considerably, but the loss on these is comparatively small. All the papers and books of the hotel arc believed to have been saved. The building was owned by the Elbridge T. Gerry eslate. There were 750 inmates when the fire broke out.