Jasper County Democrat, Volume 11, Number 67, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 January 1909 — NUMBER CHICAGO FIRE VICTIMS [ARTICLE]

NUMBER CHICAGO FIRE VICTIMS

Will Likely Be Increased To Seventy —Police Think Torch Was Dropped in Powder Room. Chicago, Jan. 21.—That the list of 50 known dead probably will be increased to 70, or even more, was the chief fact developed to-day in the official investigation of the burning of the temporary woodcrib in the lake one and a half miles off the shore of South Chicago yesterday. It was discovered that most of the workmen had died at the mouth of the shaft; and that surrounded by fire and with a wide stretch of icy water between them and the shore they sought, but failed, to reach safety by going down into the submarine tunnel. The shaft was investigated to a depth of 150 feet to-day, but no more bodies were found. It is believed, however, that bodies will be found further on and also in the lake. Thinking that as the fire occurred in the lake the fixing of responsibility for it might be under the Federal jurisdiction, the City Engineer to-day wired to Washington. It was said late to-night that the police have concluded that one of the three workmen whcT escaped from the crib will be able to explain just how the fire started. One of the men is being kept under surveillance, though he has not been arrested, and another is in the hospital. A survivor is said to have given, evidence that one of the men entered a compartment of the crib in which dynamite was stored with a lighted torch and that he either dropped the torch there or allowed some sparks from it to fly about and then left, finally escaping when the fire came.