The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado Part 4

Cloudy skies and a cold drizzling rain added to the dismal aspect of the city in the morning. The temperature fell steadily all night, and when daylight came the thermometers showed that it was only three degrees above freezing. The condition was welcomed, because it was expected that a hard freeze would aid materially in holding back the innumerable tributaries of the flooded streams and a.s.sist the earth in retaining the moisture that had been soaked into it steadily for the last five days.

By ten-thirty the water depth had lessened about two feet. All stores and factories in the main part of the town were flooded to a depth of from eight to ten feet. Numerous residences and smaller buildings collapsed, but any estimate of the property loss was impossible.

A morgue was established on the west side of the city, and efforts to recover the bodies and aid the suffering were pushed as rapidly as conditions permitted. Relief trains began to arrive in the stricken towns.

Adjutant-General Speaks, with a small detachment of troops and a squad of linemen and operators, left Columbus early Wednesday in an effort to reach Dayton. The attempt was made by means of motor boats and automobiles in the hope to establish adequate telegraph or telephone communication with Dayton.

MARTIAL LAW ESTABLISHED

A message from Governor c.o.x ordered the entire Ohio National Guard to hold itself in readiness to proceed to Dayton as soon as it was possible to enter the city.

"I understand the importance of having the militia there," he telegraphed.

Soon afterward notice was posted in headquarters of the emergency committee announcing that the city was under martial law, and several companies of soldiers arrived from neighboring Ohio cities.

The soldiers were employed to patrol edges of the burned district, and prevent looting of homes freed from the floods.

The hundreds of refugees in the Y. M. C. A. building and in the Algonquin Hotel were facing possible short rations. Their food supplies were becoming limited and drinking water was at a premium.

Forty boats were requisitioned by the city authorities and were patroling the city in an effort to save life and property. These craft were manned by volunteers.

In front of the Central Union Telegraph office the water was still running so swiftly that horses could not go through it without swimming.

One boat went by with two men in it, rowing desperately, trying to keep the bow to the waves. The boat overturned, but both men escaped drowning by swimming to a lamp post. They clung to the post for half an hour before a rope could be thrown to them. After repeated casts the line fell near enough to them to be caught, and the men were drawn into the second story window of the building.

The telephone employees in the building fished chairs, dry goods boxes and a quant.i.ty of other floating property from the flood. The debris swept down the main business street with such force that every plate gla.s.s window was smashed.

Only one sizable building had collapsed up to noon so far as the watchers in the telephone office could learn. This structure, an old one, was a three-story affair, near Ludlow Street, occupied by a harness manufacturing concern.

70,000 IMPRISONED BY THE WATER

More than 70,000 persons either were unable to reach their homes or, held in their waterlocked houses, were unable to reach land.

While those marooned in the offices and hotels were in no immediate danger of drowning there was no way food or drinking water could reach them until the flood receded. Those in the residences, however, were in constant danger both by flood and fire. First the frailer buildings were swept into the stream, many showing the faces of women and children peering from the windows. These were followed by more substantial brick buildings, until it became evident that no house in the flood zone was safe.

The houses as a rule lasted but a few blocks before disintegrating.

Incidents without number were narrated of persons in the flooded districts waving handkerchiefs and otherwise signaling for aid, being swept away before the eyes of the watchers on the margin of the waters.

Many of the rescue boats were swept by the current against what had been fire plugs, trees and houses. They were crushed. Canoes and rowboats shared the same fate. What life existed in the district which the water covered was in constant danger and helpless until the flood subsided.

Bodies were found as far out as Wayne Avenue, which is more than a mile from the river. At Fifth and Brown Streets the water reached a height of ten feet. At least one of those drowned met death in the Algonquin Hotel.

The rumor that the St. Elizabeth Hospital with 600 patients had been swept away, which gained circulation Tuesday night, proved to have been false.

Although it was impossible to reach the hospital, field gla.s.ses showed that the building was still standing. The water was not thought to be much above the first floor of the building, and it was hoped that the patients had not suffered.

Dayton was practically cut off from wire communication until late in the afternoon. Then two wires into Cincinnati were obtained and operators plunged into great piles of telegrams from Dayton citizens, almost frantic in their desire to a.s.sure friends outside of their safety.

Operators at opposite ends of the wires reported that thousands of telegrams were piled up at relay offices. These were from people anxious over the fate of Dayton kinsmen.

Two oarsmen who braved the current that swirled through the business section of the city reported that the water at the Algonquin Hotel, at the southwest corner of Third and Ludlow Streets, was fifteen feet deep.

From windows in the hotels and business buildings hundreds of the marooned begged piteously for rescue and food. The oarsmen said they saw no bodies floating on the flood tide, but declared that many persons must have perished in the waters' sudden rush through the streets.

Oarsmen who worked into the outskirts of the business section at night reported that two hundred and fifty persons marooned in the Arcade building and two hundred imprisoned in the Y. M. C. A. building were begging for water.

"SEND US FOOD!"

Before the terror of fire had dwindled, gaunt hunger thrust its wolfish head on the scene. Famine became an immediate possibility. All of the supply and grocery houses were in the submerged district and there was not enough bread to last the survivors another day. Every grocer in the city was "sold out" before noon.

The flood came with such suddenness that food supplies in homes were whisked away by the torrent that reached to second floors in almost the flash of an eye. Skiffs skirted the edge of the flooded districts attempting to take food to those whom it was impossible to carry off, but the fierce current discouragingly r.e.t.a.r.ded this work.

"Food, food, food," was the appeal that reached the outside world from the portions of Dayton north of the rivers. The plea came from a relief committee which started out in boats and met an employee of the American Telegraph and Telephone Company, who attempted to drive to Dayton. The telephone man immediately "cut in" on a line and transmitted the appeal.

The relief committee had progressed less than two miles from Dayton when they met the telephone employee. They told him that any and all kinds of provisions were needed and could be distributed, but the relief must come soon if indescribable suffering was to be avoided.

Police officers of Dayton who were able to get about at all were swearing in all available men as deputies, commandeering provisions and charging the expense to the State of Ohio. The available supplies were so slender, however, that thousands of persons on the north side of the river were already dest.i.tute. Efforts to learn the condition of the 2,500 inmates of the old soldiers' home on the west side brought a report that the inst.i.tution was in no danger because of its location on a high hill.

Leon A. Smith, one of the relief committee in North Dayton, was sworn in as a deputy justice of the peace with power to enlist other deputies to preserve order, guard against crimes and relieve distress.

"What we need most," said Mr. Smith over the telephone, "is food for the living and a.s.sistance in recovering and burying the dead before an epidemic sets in."

Farmers in the vicinity offered their teams to haul towards Dayton any supplies that could be gotten together, and the housewives of the countryside denuded their pantries.

Relief committees issued the following statement:

"An awful catastrophe has overtaken Dayton. The centers of Dayton and the residence district from the fair grounds hill to the high ground north of the city are under water.

"Bring potatoes, rice, beans, vegetables, meat and bread and any other edibles that will sustain life.

"We have cooking arrangements for several thousand. We are sending trucks to nearby towns, but ask that you haul to us, as far as possible."

The first trainload of provisions from Cincinnati, with a detail of policemen to help in the rescue work, reached Dayton after being twelve hours on the road. This, with two cars from Springfield, relieved the immediate suffering. Word also was received that a carload of supplies was on the way from Detroit.

Encouragement was received in a message from the Mayor of Springfield, who said he was sending six big trucks loaded with provisions that should reach Dayton early Thursday. With the arrival of motor boats Wednesday night it was hoped to begin to distribute provisions among the marooned early next morning.

Messages from the flood's prisoners in the business section said children were crying for milk, while their elders suffered from thirst that grew hourly. Volunteers were called for to man boats and brave the dangerous currents in an attempt to get food to the suffering.

PATTERSON CONTINUES RESCUE WORK

Rescue work efficiently managed, in which John H. Patterson was a leading spirit, proceeded smoothly throughout the day. A boat, which was engaged in rescue work, capsized, and all of the crew but Frederick Patterson, son of John H. Patterson, were drowned. Young Patterson acted as captain of the crew.

Missing members of families were restored to their loved ones through human clearing houses established at several points in the fringe of the flood district. Great ledgers filled with names presided over by volunteer bank clerks were at the disposal of persons seeking missing kinsmen. If these had registered in the clearing house their addresses were quickly given to the inquirer.

Up to seven o'clock in the evening three thousand of the homeless were housed in different places of refuge, most of them being cared for at the plant of the National Cash Register Company. Scores of the waters'

victims were being carried from their places of imprisonment late in the evening, and leaders of the rescuing parties were arranging for relays of torch bearers to light the work during the night.