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[Illustration: MAP OF THE DELUGED CONEMAUGH DISTRICT.]




                               HISTORY

                                 OF

                         THE JOHNSTOWN FLOOD.

                              INCLUDING

     ALL THE FEARFUL RECORD; THE BREAKING OF THE SOUTH FORK DAM;
      THE SWEEPING OUT OF THE CONEMAUGH VALLEY; THE OVER-THROW
              OF JOHNSTOWN; THE MASSING OF THE WRECK AT
           THE RAILROAD BRIDGE; ESCAPES, RESCUES, SEARCHES
                   FOR SURVIVORS AND THE DEAD; RELIEF
                  ORGANIZATIONS, STUPENDOUS CHARITIES,
                               ETC., ETC.

                    WITH FULL ACCOUNTS ALSO OF THE

      DESTRUCTION ON THE SUSQUEHANNA AND JUNIATA RIVERS, AND THE
                            BALD EAGLE CREEK.

                                   BY

                         WILLIS FLETCHER JOHNSON.

                           _ILLUSTRATED._

                          EDGEWOOD PUBLISHING CO.,
                                  1889.
                           Copyright, 1889, by
                         WILLIS FLETCHER JOHNSON.




PREFACE.


The summer of 1889 will ever be memorable for its appalling disasters by
flood and flame. In that period fell the heaviest blow of the nineteenth
century--a blow scarcely paralleled in the histories of civilized lands.
Central Pennsylvania, a centre of industry, thrift and comfort, was
desolated by floods unprecedented in the records of the great waters. On
both sides of the Alleghenies these ravages were felt in terrific power,
but on the western <DW72> their terrors were infinitely multiplied by the
bursting of the South Fork Reservoir, letting out millions of tons of
water, which, rushing madly down the rapid descent of the Conemaugh
Valley, washed out all its busy villages and hurled itself in a deadly
torrent on the happy borough of Johnstown. The frightful aggravations
which followed the coming of this torrent have waked the deepest
sympathies of this nation and of the world, and the history is demanded
in permanent form, for those of the present day, and for the generation
to come.




CONTENTS.


  CHAPTER I.

  The Conemaugh Valley in Springtime--Johnstown and its
    Suburbs--Founded a Hundred Years ago--The Cambria Iron
    Works--History of a Famous Industry--American Manufacturing
    Enterprise Exemplified--Making Bessemer Steel--Social and
    Educational Features--The Busiest City of its Size in the
    State,                                                         15

  CHAPTER II.

  Conemaugh Lake--Remains of an Old-time Canal System--Used for
    the Pleasure of Sportsmen--The Hunting and Fishing
    Club--Popular Distrust Growing into Indifference--The Old
    Cry of "Wolf!"--Building a Dam of Straw and Mud--Neglect
    Ripening into Fitness for a Catastrophe,                       31

   CHAPTER III.

   Dawning of the Fatal Day--Darkness and Rain--Rumors of
     Evil--The Warning Voice Unheeded--A Whirlwind of Watery
     Death--Fate of a Faithful Telegrapher--What an Eye-Witness
     Saw--A Solid Wall of Water Rushing Down the Valley,          42

   CHAPTER IV.

   The Pathway of the Torrent--Human Beings Swept away like
     Chaff--The Twilight of Terror--The Wreck of East
     Conemaugh--Annihilation of Woodvale--Locomotives Tossed
     about like Cockle-shells by the mighty Maelstrom,            51

   CHAPTER V.

   "Johnstown is Annihilated"--Appearance of the Wreck--An Awful
     Sabbath Spectacle--A Sea of Mud and Corpses--The City in a
     Gigantic Whirlpool--Strange Tokens of the Fury of the
     Flood--Scene from the Bridge--Sixty Acres of Debris--A
     Carnival of Slaughter,                                       66

   CHAPTER VI.

   Pictures of the Flood Drawn by Eye-witnesses--A Score of
     Locomotives Swallowed up--Railroad Cars Swept
     away--Engineers who would not Abandon their Posts--Awful
     Scenes from a Car Window--A Race for Life--Victims of the
     Flood,                                                       81

   CHAPTER VII.

   Some Heroes of the Flood--The Ride of Collins Graves at
     Williamsburg Recalled--John G. Parke's Heroic
     Warning--Gallant Self-Sacrifice of Daniel Peyton--Mrs. Ogle,
     the Intrepid Telegraph Operator--Wholesale Life Saving by
     Miss Nina Speck,                                             97

   CHAPTER VIII.

   Stories of Suffering--A Family Swept away at a Stroke--Beside
     a Sister's Corpse--A Bride Driven Mad--The Unidentified
     Dead--Courage in the Face of Death--Thanking God his Child
     had not Suffered--One Saved out of a Household of
     Thirteen--Five Saved out of Fifty-Five,                     108

   CHAPTER IX.

   Stories of Railroad Men and Travelers who were in the Midst of
     the Catastrophe--A Train's Race with the Wave--Houses
     Crushed like Eggshells--Relics of the Dead in the Tree
     tops--A Night of Horrors--Fire and Flood Commingled--Lives
     Lost for the Sake of a Pair of Shoes,                       119

   CHAPTER X.

   Scenes in a House of Refuge--Stealing from the Dead--A
     Thousand Bodies seen Passing over the Bridge--"Kill us or
     Rescue us!"--Thrilling Escapes and Agonizing
     Losses--Children Born amid the Flood--A Night in Alma
     Hall--Saved through Fear,                                   137

   CHAPTER XI.

   The Flight to the Mountains--Saving a Mother and her Babe--The
     Hillsides Black with Refugees--An Engineer's Story--How the
     Dam gave away--Great Trees Snapped off like Pipe-stems by
     the Torrent,                                                147

   CHAPTER XII.

   A Desperate Voyage--Scenes like those after a Great
     Battle--Mother and Babe Dead together--Praying as they
     Drifted to Destruction--Children Telling the Story of
     Death--Significant Greetings between Friends--Prepared for
     any News,                                                   154

   CHAPTER XIII.

   Salutations in the City of the Dead--Crowds at the
     Morgues--Endless Trains of Wagons with Ghastly
     Freight--Registering the Survivors--Minds Unsettled by the
     Tragedy--Horrible Fragments of Humanity Scattered through
     Piles of Rubbish,                                           161

   CHAPTER XIV.

   Recognizing the Dead--Food and Clothing for Destitute
     Survivors--Looking for the Lost--The Bereaved Burying their
     Dead--Drowned Close by a Place of Safety--A Heroic
     Editor--One who would not be Comforted,                     171

   CHAPTER XV.

   A Bird'seye View of the Ruined City--Conspicuous Features of
     the Disaster--The Railroad Lines--Stones and Iron Tossed
     about like Driftwood--An Army Officer's Valuable Services in
     Restoring and Maintaining Order,                            179

   CHAPTER XVI.

   Clearing a Road up the Creek--Fantastic Forms of Ruin--An
     Abandoned Locomotive with no Rail to Run on--Iron Beams Bent
     like Willow Twigs--Night in the Valley--Scenes and Sounds of
     an Inferno,                                                 188

   CHAPTER XVII.

   Sights that Greeted Visitors--Wreckage Along the Valley--Ruins
     of the Cambria Iron Works--A Carnival of Drink--Violence and
     Robbery--Camping on the Hillsides--Rich and Poor alike
     Benefit,                                                    198

   CHAPTER XVIII.

   The First Train Load of Anxious Seekers--Hoping against
     Hope--Many Instances of Heroism--Victims Seen Drifting down
     beyond the Reach of Help--Unavailing Efforts to Rescue the
     Prey of the Flood,                                          207

   CHAPTER XIX.

   Newspaper Correspondents Making their Way in--The Railroads
     Helpless--Hiring a Special Train--Making Desperate
     Speed--First faces of the Flood--Through to Johnstown at
     Last,                                                       216

   CHAPTER XX.

   The Work of the Reporters--Strange Chronicles of Heroism and
     of Woe--Deadly Work of the Telegraph Wires--A Baby's Strange
     Voyage--Prayer wonderfully Answered--Steam against Torrent,
                                                                 228

   CHAPTER XXI.

   Human Ghouls and Vampires on the Scene--A Short Shrift for
     Marauders--Vigilance Committees Enforcing Order--Plunderers
     of the Dead Relentlessly Dispatched--Outbursts of Righteous
     Indignation,                                                238

   CHAPTER XXII

   The Cry for Help and the Nation's Answer--President Harrison's
     Eloquent and Effective Appeal--Governor Beaver's Message--A
     Proclamation by the Governor of New York--Action of the
     Commissioner of Pensions--Help from over the Sea,           249

   CHAPTER XXIII.

   The American Heart and Purse Opened Wide--A Flood of Gold
     against the Flood of Water--Contributions from every Part
     of the Country, in Sums Large and Small,                    265

   CHAPTER XXIV.

   Benefactions of Philadelphia--Organization of Charity--Train
     loads of Food and Clothing--Generous spirit of Convicts in
     the Penitentiary--Contributions from over the Sea--Queen
     Victoria's sympathy--Letter from Florence Nightingale,      281

   CHAPTER XXV.

   Raising a Great Relief Fund in New York--Where the Money
     came from--Churches, Theatres and Prisons join in the good
     work--More than One Hundred Thousand Dollars a Day--A few
     Names from the Great Roll of Honor,                         292

   CHAPTER XXVI.

   Breaking up the Ruins and Burying the Dead--Innumerable
     Funerals--The Use of Dynamite--The Holocaust at the
     Bridge--The Cambria Iron Works--Pulling out Trees with
     Locomotives,                                                299

   CHAPTER XXVII.

   Caring for the Sufferers--Noble Work of Miss Clara Barton
     and the Red Cross Society--A Peep into a Hospital--Finding
     Homes for the Orphans--Johnstown Generous in its Woe--A
     Benevolent Eating House,                                    309

   CHAPTER XXVIII.

   Recovering from the Blow--The Voice of the Locomotive Heard
     again--Scenes Day by Day amid the Ruins and at the
     Morgue--Strange Salvage from the Flood--A Family of
     Little Children,                                            319

   CHAPTER XXIX.

   The City Filled with Life Again--Work and Bustle on Every
     Hand--Railroad Trains Coming In--Pathetic Meetings of
     Friends--Persistent Use of Dynamite to Break Up the
     Masses of Wreckage--The Daily Record of Work Amid the
     Dead,                                                       341

   CHAPTER XXX.

   Scenes at the Relief Stations--The Grand Army of the
     Republic in Command--Imposing Scenes at the Railroad
     Station--Cars Loaded with Goods for the Relief of the
     Destitute,                                                  353

   CHAPTER XXXI.

   General Hastings' Headquarters--Duties of the Military
     Staff--A Flood of Telegrams of Inquiry Pouring In--Getting
     the Post-office to Work Again--Wholesale Embalming--The
     Morgue in the Presbyterian Church--The Record of the
     Unknown Dead--A Commemorative Newspaper Club,               358

   CHAPTER XXXII.

   A Cross between a Military and a Mining Camp--Work of the
     Army Engineers--Equipping Constables--Pressure on the
     Telegraph Lines--Photographers not Encouraged--Sight-seers
     Turned Away--Strange Uses for Coffins,                      370

   CHAPTER XXXIII.

   Sunday Amid the Ruins--Services in One Church and in the
     Open Air--The Miracle at the Church of the Immaculate
     Conception--Few Women and Children Seen--Disastrous
     Work of Dynamite--A Happy Family in the Wreck,              378

   CHAPTER XXXIV.

   Plans for the Future of Johnstown--The City to be Rebuilt
     on a Finer Scale than Ever Before--A Real Estate Boom
     Looked For--Enlarging the Conemaugh--Views of
     Capitalists,                                                387

   CHAPTER XXXV.

   Well-known People who Narrow