The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado Part 40

A far more terrible story of death and destruction is that of the St.

Louis tornado of May 27, 1896, which lasted but half an hour, killed 306 persons and destroyed property to the amount of $12,000,000.

The same tornado visited many places in Missouri and Illinois, causing an additional property loss of $1,000,000.

The sky grew black at 4 P. M., the sun was eclipsed in the whirl of driving dust and dirt, mingled with the branches and leaves of trees, the boards of buildings and other loose material torn off by the wind.

At times the wind blew eighty miles an hour. In that mad half hour, while property was crumbling and hundreds of human lives being snuffed out, thousands of maimed and bleeding persons were added to the awful harvest of devastation.

FREAK DESTRUCTION

Over in East St. Louis, where the houses were all frail structures, the destruction was greatest. The great Eads Bridge was twisted all out of shape, and freight cars were tossed to and fro, tumbled into ditches and driven sometimes into the fields many yards from where they had stood.

The great Vandalia freight house fell in a heap of utter ruin, burying beneath it thirty-five men who had there sought refuge.

The swath cut was three blocks wide and four miles long. The top of the bridge was knocked off as well as the big abutment. The Martell House was blown into the c.o.kokia Creek and many were buried in the ruins.

To add to the horrors of the night the electric-light plants were rendered incapable of service, and the gas lamps were also shut off, leaving the city in utter darkness. Fire broke out in several portions of the city, and the fire department was unable to make an effective fight because of the choked condition of the streets and the large number of firemen who were engaged in the imperative work of rescuing the dead and wounded.

ANNIHILATION

The City Hospital, which fortunately survived the storm, was filled to overflowing with the injured. In addition to those who were killed in their houses and in the streets, scores of dead were carried away by the waters of the Mississippi River. Many steamers on the levee went down in the storm. From the "Great Republic," one of the largest steamers on the lower river, not a man escaped. The word "annihilation" is perhaps the only one that can adequately describe the awful work of the tornado.

The rising of the sun in the morning revealed a scene of indescribable horror. The work of carrying out the maimed and dead immediately began, but it was a task of big proportions, as many bodies were totally buried under the debris. Hundreds of families were rendered homeless, and the business portion of the community was almost in absolute ruin.

Lack of food added to the misery. Bread sold for fifteen cents a loaf. A large number of military tents were s.h.i.+pped into the city and many families found shelter in freight yards. The Ohio and Mississippi railroad companies issued permits for the use of their empty cars.

Contributions to aid in the work of rebuilding and relief were received and the city council voted $100,000.

It was several weeks before the city began to resume a normal existence.

The presence of armed men and endless piles of debris, the suspension of traffic, the grief for departed dear ones, and the sight of the many injured, all contributed to a condition of solemnity and sorrow. "The memory of the strange and awful scenes that have been presented by East St. Louis for the past three days," said one clergyman of the city, "will live in the minds of its inhabitants for years. But our people are too courageous and energetic to be deterred from repairing the physical havoc wrought."

PREVIOUS GREAT DISASTERS

FLOODS

Johnstown, Pa., breaking of the Conemaugh dam, May 31, 1889; 2,235 killed.

Galveston, Tex., tidal wave, September 8, 1900; 9,000 killed.

Mississippi Valley, May, 1912; 1,000 killed.

WIND STORMS

Adams County, Miss., May 7, 1840; 317 killed. Same county, June, 1842; 500 killed.

Louisville, Ky., March 27, 1890; 113 killed, 200 injured; property loss, $2,500,000.

Cherokee, Buena Vista and Pocahontas Counties, Iowa, July 6, 1893, 89 killed; property loss, $250,000.

Little Rock, Ark., October 2, 1894; 4 killed; property loss, $500,000.

Denton and Grayson Counties, Tex., May 15, 1896; 78 killed and 150 injured; property loss, $165,000.

St. Louis and East St. Louis, Mo., May 27, 1896; 306 identified killed; property loss, $12,000,000. Same tornado visited many places in Missouri and Illinois, causing an additional property loss of $1,000,000.

West India hurricane, September 29 and 30, 1896, covering Florida, Georgia, South and North Carolina, Virginia, District of Columbia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New York; 114 killed; property loss, $7,000,000.

Eastern Michigan, May 25, 1897; 47 killed, 100 injured; property loss, $400,000.

Galveston hurricane, September 8, 1900; 9,000 killed; property loss, $30,000,000; estimated wind velocity, 120 miles an hour.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

LESSONS OF THE CATACLYSM AND PRECAUTIONARY MEASURES

NOT A VISITATION OF PUNISHMENT--THE HELPLESSNESS OF MAN BEFORE NATURE--THE KINs.h.i.+P OF HUMANITY--INCENTIVE TO ENTERPRISE--THE GREATEST LESSON--MEASURES AGAINST REPEt.i.tION OF DISASTER--UTILIZING NATURAL RESERVOIRS--PROMOTION OF FORESTRY--CONSTRUCTION OF DAMS--SECRETARY LANE'S PLAN--A PROBLEM FOR THE PANAMA ENGINEERS.

With each succeeding dispatch from the districts stricken by flood and tornado it became clearer that the first impressions of the disaster, shocking as they were, fell not far beneath the dreadful reality.

Hundreds overwhelmed in the rus.h.i.+ng floods, hundreds of thousands spared from sudden death only to suffer hunger and thirst and hards.h.i.+p and the perils of fire, cities submerged, villages swept away, countless homes and vast industries destroyed, miles upon miles of populous land drowned under turbulent waters, and over all the grim shadows of starvation and disease--this catastrophe defies picture and parallel to express its desolating horror.

The widespread calamity, which smote with its cruelest force the beautiful city of Dayton, is one of those for which no personal responsibility can be placed. Like the tidal flood which devastated Galveston and the earth upheaval which laid San Francisco in ruins, it is a convulsion which could not have been foreseen or stayed.

NOT A VISITATION OF PUNISHMENT

In the presence of such a fearful disaster there are few persons who will say, but there are some who will think, that this is in some manner a visitation decreed upon the communities which suffer. The very magnitude and superhuman force of it will suggest to many minds the thought of an ordered punishment and warning for offenses against a higher power.

Such a concept, happily more rarely held than in earlier times, is, of course, revolting to sober judgment and to the instincts of religious reverence. For it would imply that mult.i.tudes of the innocent should suffer indescribable cruelty; it would attempt the impossible feat of justifying the smiting of Dayton, where the inhabitants lived lives of peaceful, helpful industry, and the sparing of communities where men serve the G.o.ds of dishonest wealth and vicious idleness.

This was no vengeance decreed for human shortcomings. It was superhuman, but not supernatural. It was but a manifestation of the unchangeable, irresistible forces of nature, governed by physical laws which are inexorable. Nature knows neither revenge nor pity. She does not select her victims, nor does she turn aside to save the good who may be in her path. As her concern is not with individuals, but with the race, so she is moved not by mercy, but by law.

To the limited vision of man, with his brief life, nature seems incredibly cruel and wasteful. Her teachings must be learned at fearful cost. Men will ask themselves what lessons are taught by this overwhelming sacrifice.

THE HELPLESSNESS OF MAN BEFORE NATURE

There is made plain, first, the utter powerlessness of man when he pits his strength against the full demonstration of the laws of nature. It is revealed, again, that there are forces which before all the might of human intellect remain unconquerable. The same grim lesson confronts the scientist whose babe is s.n.a.t.c.hed from him by death; it confronts the millionaire who feels the chill of age creeping upon the frame that has upheld the finances of a nation and has made and unmade panics with the crooking of a finger.