Jasper County Democrat, Volume 5, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 31 May 1902 — IN VOLCANOES’ WAKE. [ARTICLE]

IN VOLCANOES’ WAKE.

AWFUL CONDITIONS ON MARTINIQUE AND ST. VINCENT. Devastated Island* Where Death la Regnant and Pestilence Threatens— Air Polluted by Unburied DeadMount Pelee Still Menace*. Like fitful monsters the volcanic mountains of Mount Pelee and La Soufriere still threaten the islands of Martinique and St. Vincent and the surrounding seas. The terrific energy exerted the week before last, when St. Pierre was wiped out of existence and the northern half of the island of St. Vincent was turned into a calcined ruin, has ceased; but the volcanoes still are active intermittently, now belching forth torrents of. ashes, now sending only clouds of smoke and vapor into the air, but at all times dreadful, black, ugly and menacing. St. Pierre at times rests beneath a pall of smoke and sulphurous, impalpable ashes. The air is hot and stifling and the workers amid the ruins of palaces and huts look toward the volcano nervously, fearing each moment that another cyclone of fire may shoot from the mouth of the crater, to blast, incinerate and destroy. Several times the searchers have been driven from the ruins by sudden and heavy eruptions, which were powerful enough to rain down ashes in the streets of Fort de France, ten miles distant. Some of these eruptions were accompanied by thunder, which shook the island, and by blinding flashes of lightning. Some of the people around St. Pierre, who had returned to their homes, were driven forth again by these displays and made their way to Fort de France. They report that new volcanoes have been formed in the neighborhood of Mount Pelee and the belief is now wellnigh general that other eruptions, perhaps as dreadful as those of May 8, when St. Pierre was destroyed, will occur. Amid the Ruin*. Meantime the work of,, searching the ruins of the city is being slowly prosecuted. The stench from putrefying bodies and the stifling odor from volcanic matter render tbe work painful and dangerous. Few of the bodies are identifiable. Most of them are covered by volcanic deposits and much time will be required to exhume them. Bodies are being found in all kinds of conditions. Some are calcined; others are free from burns. The whole scene is one of heartrending horror and pity. And yet in spite of the supreme tragedy; in spite of Death’s presence at every turn; in spite of the menacing danger that sits enthroned, like a malignant spirit, upon Mount Pelee, human ghouls are busy plundering the dead. Some have been shot down in their tracks by the French guards; some have been arrested and sentenced to various periods of imprisonment, but neither death nor deprivation of liberty is sufficient to deter the human hyenas and in the outlying districts looting still goes on. An official estimate of those who were buried in the ruins of St. Pierre gives the number at 28.000. In addition 3,000 persons were drowned and became the prey of sharks. A, fifth of the surface of the island was burned and the other fonr-fifttas are covered with ashes. At Riviere Blanche, a suburban town of St. Pierre, the deposit of mud is twenty feet deep. Here it was that the first great eruption of the volcano on May 5 manifested itself, burying the Guerin sugar mill and killing twenty-three persons. Horrible Condition* on Ft. Vincent. On the Island of St. Vincent conditions are horrible. The whole northern part of the island is a ruin. Just now La Soufriere is reduced to passivity, but no one can tell when the volcano may become active again and belch forth death and destruction. All the earlier estimates of the dead were too low. At first it was thounght that oply 500 persons perished, but daily since the horror has grown. Up tn the present 1,800 dead bodies have been found *nd buried or burned. Four hundred more victims are scattered over the northern part of the island, some exposed and rotting under the tropical sun, some buried beneath deposits of ashes and lava. The carcasses of thousands of domestic animals are scattered over the scene of desolation, poisoning the atmosphere nnd creating pestilence. Frightful odors permeate the island and pestilence has already made its appearance. Immense fire* are now blazing in the region devastated and in them the carcasses of animals are being cremated. Fortunately the wants of the people both in Martinique and St. Vincent are now relieved owing to the generous charity of the United States and to the private aid that flowed in from a multiplicity of sources. Never before in the world’s history has assistance so spontaneously and so copiously been bestowed.