STILL THE CALAMITY GROWS
THE NUMBNER OF CHARRED CORPSES NOW ESTIMATED AT 450.
UTTER DESOLATION IN A SCORE OF TOWNS.
Hinckley, Sandstone, and Other Prosperous Villages Wiped Out of Existence.
STORIES OF THE SURVIVORS.
The History of the Fire, Now Becoming Fully Known, Marks It as the Most Awful in the History of the Northwest—Aside from the Great Loss of Life the Property Destroyed Will Aggregate Many Millions—Several Counties in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan Denuded of Buildings, Crops, and Growing Timber—Fires Are Raging in Western New-York, and Everywhere Farmers Can’t Sleep Nights for Fear They Will Be Burned Out.
PINE CITY, Minn., Sept. 4.—The General Executive Committee in charge of the relief work in this section has made a report of the dead bodies recovered thus far, as follows;
HINCKLEY, 271.
SANDSTONE, 77.
MILLER, (often called Sandstone Junction) 15.
Between SKUNK LAKE and MILLER, 12.
POKEGAMA, 25.
In lumber camps, 50.
Total, 450.
The heaviest losses at Sandstone are: Sandstone Quarry Company, $25,000; Martin Ring’s store and sawmill, $15,000; new schoolhouse, $15,000, besides the forty dwellings, ranging in value from $1,000 to $3,000.
There were also a number of shanties under the bluff on the Stone Quarry Company’s property, in which resides 20 Swede families. The total loss there may reach $3,000.
Everything at Sandstone has been burned, the only thing left standing being the schoolhouse walls and a big bank safe. The only living thing to be seen there when the relief party arrived was a horse and a pig. Sixty-two bodies have been buried thus far in town, not counting the numbers which have been found in the outlying country and which were buried where found.
Ghouls are at work in that vicinity. Today, a party from Duluth, under James Bailey, came down to help bury the dead, and while searching around at noon came upon men who had broken open and rifled some safes, and when Bailey and his party met them they had just found a cistern, from which they had hauled fifteen dead bodies and had robbed them of jewelry, rings, trinkets, &c., and were throwing the bodies back into the well. Bailey and party were unarmed, and the ghouls took to their heels and escaped.
A frame powder magazine at Sandstone, a portion of which was left standing and which was empty, was torn down for material for coffins.
The fire was seen by the Sandstone people four hours before it struck the town, and everything was packed, in readiness to move to Kettle River, east of the village. Before any one was aware of the real danger the fire came upon the town from the north, east, and west, and fired the whole town inside of five minutes.
Many were unable to reach the river and died in the streets. A blacksmith was burned to a crisp in his shop, where he was shoeing a hose. So sudden was the fire, not a thing was saved, and in thirty minutes the whole town was swept off the earth. Those who reached the river remained there most of the night.
The survivors are entirely destitute and have not even clothing on their backs, except such as is provided by the relief committees. Whole families are dead.
President Samuel Hill of the Eastern Minnesota Branch of the Great Northern came up from Hinckley this morning and took a Great Northern train over the St. Paul and Duluth Road.
Mr. Hill took the Duluth Road to Within nine miles of Sandstone and walked over. The big Eastern Minnesota Bridge over the Kettle River has a steel arch in the middle 180 feet long and is still intact, though the wooden approaches are burned.
“The scene of death and ruin along the road is a terrible one,” says Mr. Hill. “Not a sign of life is anywhere to be seen. All is a blackened, charred mass of ruins. Dead animals and human beings are everywhere, and they are burned wherever found. In one old well were found twenty-five snakes and forty or fifty field mice, all in together alive.
“There were many peculiar features of the fire. In one place, where all else was burned and blackened, we found a wagon with hay in the box intact, while the horses were dead.
“There is yet to be closed up on the Eastern Minnesota a gap of twelve miles between Hinckley and Duluth, eight miles of which are between Hinckley and Sandstone. There are four miles in the St. Cloud direction which will be closed up by tomorrow. I noticed in one place some freightcar wheels which were melted, while not 300 feet away another car was untouched.
“We fed a little fellow twelve years old at Sandstone; the rest of the family was burned.”
Judge Nethaway of Stillwater has been one of the most active in relief work, and has been all over the surrounding country. He found the family of Jack Robinson, man, wife, and several children, all dead and hardly recognizable, and also found J. O. Rowley, passenger agent of the Duluth and Winnipeg.
Seven miles northwest of Hinckley to-day he came to a spot where a farmhouse had stood. In front was a well, and over to the left could be seen five human bodies and the bodies of several animals. Judge Nethaway went at once to the well to see if any one was there, and found down in the bottom a little twelve-year-old boy in eight inches of water, who had lived there since Saturday with nothing to eat.
The little fellow was pulled up, and said he had been put down there when the fire was seen, and an “awful bad smoke had passed over him and it was awful hot.” He asked the Judge if he knew where his father and mother were and his dog. Judge Nethaway took him on his back to where he could be fed, while other parties went back after the five bodies.
At Hinckley to-day the full realization of the awful calamity is just beginning to be felt. The work recovering dead bodies continued. Many of the survivors are returning and are living in tents. To-day a large number of bodies were recovered. Coroner Cowan sent out fifty-seven, while sixty-eight were buried in the graveyard, and more were being brought in all the time.
At Gravel Pit there are dozens of dead horses and cows, burned wagons, and the smell which goes up from Hinckley is a terrible one. A heavy cloud of smoke from the immense fires hangs over the remains of the town, through which is seen a small red ball. This is the sun.
Portions of human bodies, a hand, a leg, an arm, or bloody clothing are strewn here and there about the town, while on some of the streets are dead animals of all descriptions. At the graveyard the terrible scene still remains, as does the awful stench. Monday’s big pile of bodies has been put under ground, some piled promiscuously in a trench 6 feet wide and 40 feet long, while others are put two, five, or seven in a big pine box, and buried. On the ground where the 200 bodies were piled in a small mass of burned clothing, here and there a charred hand or foot. Words cannot be found to describe the scene abut the town this afternoon.
Where the depot stood was a burned, charred hand; further down the tracks lay a woman’s limb, while out in the surrounding country one finds human trunks, heads, or bones.
Late this afternoon the body of a man with intestines exposed and body black as coal was brought into town along with a child’s fearfully burned body and a man’s leg and shoe. All were thrown into one pine coffin and buried
A few miles out in the woods, on the Eastern Minnesota, was found the body of a man, and a few feet away a rifle; in another place a woman’s trunk, the legs and arms having been burned off.
Lee Webster, Mayor of Hinckley, has lost his wife, and, while feeling quite sure she is head, he is searching everywhere for her. To-day he had nine bodies disinterred that he might examine them.
Hinckley survivors say if every one had gone to the big gravel pit all would have been saved. Many went to the swamp across the river, from which as many as 100 corpses have been taken. One farmer, whose name cannot be learned, who lived about half way between Miller and Sandstone, killed himself when he saw his wife and three children, and his son-in-law, wife and child all burned to death before his very eyes, and his home, stock, and savings of a lifetime swept away.
MORA, Minn., Sept. 4.—It is reported that the settlement of Sand Lake, nine miles west of the Finlayson, containing about 100 Finns, is all wiped out. If so, the people are probably dead. Pine Lake, two miles toward Finlayson, is all right, and so the other may be safe.
MARSHFIELD, Wis., Sept 4.—Mayor Eiche received a message from Spencer today asking for assistance, as the town was surrounded by fire. Help was also asked from Stevens Point. A special train from that place, with a fire engine, paused here this afternoon, taking about fifty men from here. Spencer lies eight miles north of here on the Wisconsin Central, and has about 400 inhabitants. A high wind is blowing ,and the worst is feared.
