Rensselaer Union, Volume 2, Number 34, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 May 1870 — The Richmond Disaster. [ARTICLE]

The Richmond Disaster.

Thx bells had just tolled the hour of 11, and death like silence reigned, as Mr. Starke, the Clerk, entered and placed his books on the table. Judge Joynes was in his seat Mr. Starke, leaning over the railing, was talking with him, while the rest of the judges were in the conferenceroom, not. quite prepared to enter upon their day’s duty. The counsel for Mayor Ellyson, Messrs. Neeson and Meredith, had taken their seats and were ready to proceed to business. Ex Governor Wells and L. H. Chandler, Esq., were also in their places, and the reporters of the Enquirer, Dispatch, Whig, and State Journal were at the desks set apart for their use and accommodation. The moments were spent In pleasant conversation by the spectators present. Various were the speculations as to the final result, when, all at once, a panel piece of ceiling fell, and then the girder, which is represented by the line of partition between the Clerk’s office and the court room, gave way withan awful crash, and precipitated the spectators who were in the gallery of the court room to the main floor, and the additional weight in one single moment’s time crushing the court-room floor through. The mass of human beings who .were in attendance were sent, mingled with the bricks, mortar, splinters, beams, iron bars, desks, and chairs, to the floor of 'the House of Delegates, and in a second more over fifty souls were launched into eternity! The whole atmosphere was thick with a dense cloud of dust from the plastering, and the human beings sent up a groan which will ring forever in the ears upon which it felt In a moment, a few survivors clinging to the windows and fragments of hanging timber, and the bare and torn walls, were all that remained to mark the place where, only a moment before there was a scene of life, vigor and hope. The scene about the Capitol building just after the sad occurrence was one of terror. The first notice that those who were in the building had of the impending evil was the premonitory rumbling as the floor was settling. Then there came a fearful crash, accompanied by a cry of human agony and terror which smote the hearts of ail who heard it. Id a moment the frightful situation was realized. The few who had been so fortunate as to be able to get into the windows shouted aloud for help for those who had fallen, and called for ladders. In a short time the bells were tolling, and the hook and ladder truck being brought upon the spot, the ladders were put up to the windows, and the work of humanity began. The blinding dust within prevented any one from seeing anything, and the rushing of persons within the building and the erics of the wounded were all that could be "heard. - ‘

|n the House of Delegates there was a Scene that fairly made one’s heart' bleed. As the dust cleared away a little, a mass of timbers and rubbish of every description was descried, and the reflection of the numbers of human beings crushed beneath its weight, dead and dying, was sickening, . Add to this the crick and groans of those who were there, many in the agony of death, and there is a picture to make the stoutest hearts quail The entire hall was flooded with the ruins, ex eept the space under the gallery. Desks, chairsand tables were crushed completely, showing the .force of the falling wreck. The work of removing the debris was a difficult one, but was undertaken by thoee present with a will, and it was not long before the unfortunate meh were being rescued from their palnftil position. The doors and windows of the hall were

thrown open, and within were soon collected the busy workers, who, amid their own shouts and the agonized groans of those they were seeking to rescue, were removing Cha timbers As th* wounded and deaa were reached, they were brought out and placed in the Senate Chamber, or else under the trees in the square, where they were attended by our city physicians and others, who were on hand with such appliances as could be, obtained. As the men were brought out, they were so covered with dust that they could scarcely be recognized, and for a while the anxious inquiries of the bystanders, “ Who is he T * could not be answered. One by out they were borne out—the dead and dying. Here was one man gled tod silently enduring, another crying aloud with pain, while the still form of a third told too well that its spirit had fled to another world. In one moment the gray hairs of age could bo descried upon the head of some dead one, while in the next the tall, manly form of one who had been cut off in the full bloom of life was being borne past. It seemed as if sickening horrors would never cease, and ages seemed to pass in the performance of this sad duty. The tolling of bells, the rushing and shouting of excited men, and the news of the fearful calamity, which spread like wild-fire over the city in an incredible short space of time, brought an immense crowd of all classes, ages and colors, to the square. Hundreds of wives, mothers, and friends, were constantly filling the grounds, who, with wringing hands, sought, in despair, to know if any of their loved ones had been of the number mangled. War, with its horrors, its agonies, its sad separations, its ghastly wounds, its horrible deaths, pictures to the mind no such scene as the one which was yesterday enacted in the square.— Richmond Diepatch, April 28.