Rensselaer Republican, Volume 20, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 March 1888 — CAUGHT IN A TRAP. [ARTICLE]

CAUGHT IN A TRAP.

Six Persona Killed by til* Burning ol th» Springfield (BIa»s.) Union Office. Just after tbe forms had gone down to the press room of the Springfield, Mass., Union,Wednesday afternoon, fire was discovered in the building, and before the employes on the upper floors knew of their danger, escape was cut off by the stairways. The unfortunate men and women who crowded into the editorial room met a horrible fate. The employes who rushed into the editorial rooms were cut off from the escape in the rear, and had to face the alternative of burning to death or a jump to the sidewalk belo> and frightful mutilation. The fire department responded promptly, but it seemed an age before it reached the window on the fifth story. A ladder was put up to the fourth story, and the sight of rescue so near seemed to madden the suffering group at the two in succession to the sidewalk below. Six fell in this way, some of them forced off and some madly leaping, and tbe crowd groaned and turned their heads away as they whirled through the atr. The Ices on building is about $140,000.