“IT WAS A TERRIBLE THING TO SEE”
DOWNTOWN DAYTON – Part Six
A. J. BARD
A. J. Bard, along with an estimated one hundred and fifty others, was penned in the City National Bank Building on Third Street, when it caught fire. Bard tells of their desperate attempt to escape the flames.
One hundred and fifty of us were caught in the building. We remained there until the fire started, then we began to plan an escape.
We cut the elevator cables, obtained a ball of twine and some small wire from one of the offices. We attracted a boatman, who risked his life to come to us. We gave the boatman one end of the twine and he rowed to the old courthouse. We then pulled the wire over, and after that the heavy cable.
One end of the cable was made fast in the bank building and the other in the old courthouse. Then, with only the light of the burning structure the 150 persons in the bank building went their way, and over hand, along the cable over the swirling torrent to the courthouse. I believe every one, men and women, made the trip in safety.
MRS. J. H. SMELL
Mrs. J. H. Smell, along with her husband, was visiting her daughter L. Mabel Curtis at 23 North Crescent when the flood hit. Mrs. Smell was from Muncie, Indiana and her story was reported in The Muncie Morning Star on April 1, 1913.
Tuesday morning we were awakened at 6 o’clock by the shrieking of whistles and the ringing of bells all over the city telling the people that something terrible was happening. Before we could dress ourselves and reach the window the streets were flooded with water.
All day Tuesday the water rose rapidly and in the afternoon everybody sought refuge in the attic of the Curtis home. The men built a temporary bridge with shutters from window to window and we got to safety.
There were twenty-three in our party. When evening came and darkness fell the escaping gas made it almost impossible for us to strike a match or have the least light, so we had to lie down on our hard bunks, realizing that the water was drawing nearer and nearer to us.
We could not sleep. Everywhere outside there was distress. The stillness of the night was broken by the cries and screams for help from the stricken people. We were powerless to help them. We heard the frantic chopping of people who were making holes in the roofs of houses so that others might escape a terrible death…
J. L. WILDS
J. L. Wilds, from Boston, had hopes of reaching Columbus the next day when he retired for the night at the Beckel Hotel where he had been staying during his visit to Dayton. He was due for a rude awakening.
I was awakened at 5:30 A.M. Monday morning, March 24, 1913 by the continuous blowing of whistles in various parts of Dayton, and, thinking that perhaps it meant a fire, I hurried down to learn that they were the signals of warning to the people on the low ground that the levees were in a precarious condition and liable to burst at any moment. Thinking that maybe conditions were not as serious as they were being represented, and that I could get to Columbus in spite of the rumors of ‘bridges out’, I paid my bill and walked down to the union station, intending to take the morning train. I inquired of the agent as to when the next train was expected to leave, and he pleasantly informed me that, while there was ‘nothing doing yet,’ a train would probably leave at 11 A.M. I strolled over to the river bank to see exactly what the trouble was, then leisurely made my way back to the [Beckel] hotel, registered again and went to my room to await the subsiding of the river.
I was there perhaps 10 minutes, when yells and screams began to come up from the streets. Hurrying to the elevator, I rang several times, to which no attention was paid, and upon looking down the shaft I saw a stream of muddy water pouring into the bottom floor. A sound of rushing water could be heard in the streets. I hastened down to the lobby to find about three inches of yellow water covering the floor, rising as we watched it several inches a minute, it seemed.
A number of us climbed to the fire escape better to witness the sight, when a crash was heard. Women’s screams came from the halls of the hotel and from buildings across the way, men shouting and pointing to our side of the street. Not knowing exactly what the trouble was, two of us started down the ground ladder of the escape, thinking that if some one had fallen in we might be able to fish them out. We little dreamed that the sound we heard was a part of our own house falling in. Climbing back into the hall, we found it filled with dust or smoke, we knew not which. All around were ashen-faced men and women. It was the only time there was any semblance of a panic, and that was over in a moment.
The floors and part of the hotel that collapsed fell through to the basement. My room had been in this section the day before, but having checked out I had to give it up, and, although on my return I asked for it, I was put in another part of the building. I suppose I have the Lord to thank for that and not the hotel keeper. All day long we paced the floor and watched the rising flood. Our only amusement was to take some sign and bet with each other as to how long before certain lines would be reached and covered. I do not mind admitting that any of us would have been most cheerful losers betting on the rising tide.
As my room was on the opposite corner from the side affected, I decided to risk spending the night there. Groping my way to my room, I found a blanket, wrapped up and threw myself across the bed. I slept in naps, as the moaning, drowning horses beneath my window and the bright light shining in from fires far and near was too much for my nerves.
The glares of the night before warned us that we might expect a fire to break out at any moment in our midst, and about 2 P.M. Wednesday afternoon this thing, most dreaded, happened. There was a shout from across the street, and we looked up Third Street to see tongues of flame shoot into the air. I forgot that for the moment I was not an inspector, and hunting up the proprietor, ‘urgently’ advised him to gather all the buckets at his command, attach ropes to same, so that we could have a fighting chance of saving our building by protecting the wooden window frames and cornices. He promised to take my advice as a last resort.
It was decided best to get as far away from the fire as possible, so grips were hastily packed and blankets pulled from beds, and we began our journey across the roofs to a new building that would afford safety at least for a time. The women were braver than some of the men, and not a whimper could be heard from them, only a squeal occasionally from the younger ones when one tried to take a step longer than was allowed by her hobble skirt, or as we took them under our arms to put them over the walls.
Wednesday night was one long watch. We sat by the windows and watched the fire creep from one building to another. When a saloon was reached one explosion followed another with sickening rapidity. The roof of one building was blown off as a whole, and fell on the adjoining store. About 2 o’clock the fire seemed to have died down, and we were beginning to breathe with some comfort again, when [there was] a mighty explosion... Sheets of murky red illuminated the night and showers of sparks and embers fell on every side. The buildings across the street, which had been withstanding the rain of burning brands for hours, seemed as if they would escape destruction, but a few moments after the explosion a small flicker could be seen on a window sill in a large warehouse, and, fascinated, we watched it creep up the frame. Soon the heat cracked the windowpanes, and the light seemed to disappear, but in a few moments smoke in puffs could be seen oozing from under the roof. Most of the buildings on that side were wholesale paint warehouses, and the sight caused by the explosion of combustible contents of tanks, although of grave significance to us, was magnificent.
The night dragged on. When the fire had mostly burned itself out, and it was evident the Beckel Hotel was not to be destroyed by fire, we retraced our steps over the roofs back to the house.
Thursday morning we were overjoyed to find that the water had made a rapid retreat, and by Thursday afternoon, by crossing over the roofs at the back of the hotel we could reach the streets. Several of us did this, and, happening on a fruit store where there were oranges, grapefruit and lemons, we washed the mud off in the curb water and had a feast.
We enjoyed a good sleep Thursday night, and Friday morning found the water so far gone that we were able to reach the sidewalk at one side of the hotel. Hurriedly packing our grips, we made our way to the temporary station for relief trains on the Pennsylvania railroad.
We forgot we had nothing to eat until we saw a relief station which consisted of a man handing out sandwiches from a large basket. I secured one and made immediate use of it, putting my grips down every now and then to take a bite – and thus we left Dayton.
BENJAMIN F. HERSHEY
Attorney Benjamin F. Hershey wrote to his friend, Fremont J. C. Little, a fellow lawyer living in Augusta, Georgia about the flood. Benjamin and his wife Minnie, lived at 337 West First Street in downtown Dayton.
I shall try and give you a meager accounting of the flood but cannot describe it so as to give you an adequate conception; you would have to see it to get that. I mail you some views which were taken, however, after the water had fallen and which do not show it at its highest point.
Imagine a beautiful city of 120,000 inhabitants, with practically every business house and thousands of residences, many of them of the best in the city, submerged in from five to twenty-five feet of water. Proprietors and employees penned in the stories above from Tuesday until Friday with nothing to do but watch the destruction. One man told me he saw from large piano store the pianos float out of the store and down the street, one following the other like geese. Many of our business rooms were finished very elegantly in mahogany and other fine material. I noticed in some of our banks the counters and furniture all piled up in one corner that did not get out into the street and float away. Added to this, each night the sky was lighted with fires in different parts of the city. On one of the main streets and practically in the business center an entire block on each side of the street with the exception of one building on each side was totally destroyed.
On Monday, March 24th, we were all busy at business, went home in the evening as usual with nothing out of the ordinary having happened except for an unusually hard rain. On Tuesday morning about five o’clock, Mrs. Hershey, occupying a front room, called my attention to an unusual amount of water in the street. I told her not to be frightened, that it would amount to nothing and for her to rest a while longer. About six she again called to me, when I arose and noticed the gutters and streets running quite full of water. I then began to give matters some attention. In less than an hour the water was over the sidewalk. I yet had no fears of any damage other than, perhaps, the water filling the cellar. Soon, however, a boat came down First Street, where I lived calling to people that water would come into the first stories. My boy, 14 years old, Mrs. Hershey, myself and the servant constituted the family at home, my older boy being away at college. We began to carry up stairs rugs, books and such light furniture as we could move. I paid no attention to the bric-a-brac, etc., on the mantels and pictures on the walls. Our house setting up high above the street, I could not imagine the water interferingin any way with these, but the water kept coming up and that very rapidly. About the last thing I did, wading about in my rubber boots, was to tie the portieres in knots over my head. When the water came in over my boot tops, I took a view of the situation, concluding that all articles on the mantelpieces and furniture that we had piled up on chairs would certainly be safe, but that the piano, sideboard, etc. would get ‘wet feet.’ You may imagine my consternation, however, when the water continued to rise rapidly, part of the time over two feet an hour, all that day and night until midnight.
H. H. RICKEY
H. H. Rickey, a structural engineer, was rooming in a double house at 21 Sycamore Street. The water rose high enough that he and five others had to take refuge in an unheated attic.
I was rooming in a house at 21 Sycamore Street. Fortunately, it was a substantial brick building of the duplex type. Early on Tuesday morning the flood swept into the city and I was awakened by the sound of water rushing into the cellar. The landlady called all of us who were rooming in the house and told us that the flood was filling the basement. Previously whistles and church bells had been sounding to warn the town, but I had been sleeping so soundly that I had not heard them.
The first thing I thought of was the warehouse of the A. Bentley & Sons Co., with whom I am employed. The warehouse was down by the levee. I started for it and routed out a couple of the company’s men. We got there in time to get a couple of the horses out. Then the flood was coming up so rapidly that I bid the man with me he had better save himself. I started back to my rooming house on the horse, but a little way from the house the horse refused to go further. I got off and made my way to the house through water chest deep. I have never seen nor heard of the horse since.
Within half an hour the water rose four feet and continued to climb all day Tuesday and most of the night. For safety we five people in the house had taken refuge in the attic. In the adjoining attic there were six more people. For the first day and a half until relief came the five of us had only a small bottle of water and a single sandwich to divide between us.
All day Tuesday and part of Wednesday the rain fell. Without heat in the attic it became bitter cold. A person who has not gone through such an ordeal has no idea of what suffering the marooned people endured. On the roof of a house back of us six people scantily clad, sat all through Tuesday and Tuesday night, being rescued on Wednesday morning. During all the time there was no way of making heat. At night we could have no lights. A person could no sooner strike a match than someone in the neighborhood command him to put it out. Only those who were fortunate enough to have electric searchlights had light at night.
From the attic we could look out of windows at the north and south. I could not begin to describe the things I saw float down the street past our windows. I must have seen fifty pianos in the flood. Tables without number and furniture of all kinds drifted by. One table floated by with linen still on it, the spoon holder, sugar bowl and other dishes in the middle of the table just as though the table were sitting in the middle of a dining room. One of the most peculiar sights I witnessed was that of six big rats seated on a case of beer, which was being borne along on the flood.
We rigged up a fishing apparatus out of a waste paper basket and a long pole and picked up all kinds of trinkets from the flood – small articles of merchandise, drug store articles and various pieces of wearing apparel.
We were taken out Friday morning when the water had gone down to about two feet. Everywhere the ruin wrought by the flood was in evidence. The entire property of many people is completely wiped out of existence. An inch to eight inches of mud covered everything. There were many freakish sights, too. Near our place a long barn had been floated down and deposited so it blocked the street. At a place on Monument Avenue a huge timber sixty feet long had been deposited with one end on a porch and the other in the window of a house, bridging completely across a vacant lot which lay between the two houses.
GEORGE A. F. ADRIAN
George A. F. Adrian, a drug clerk, was at work when the flood hit the city.
I was in the drug store when the river first broke through its banks. For two days before all of the people in Dayton had been in a state of fear on account of the heavy rains and the rising river, but we never expected a flood.
I heard the alarm bells ringing, and people shouting “The dam has broken”. I ran outside and saw crowds of people rushing like mad down the street, and in the distance I could see the water coming. I joined the rush and we all ran for our lives to higher ground. The crowd was fearful, and I was knocked down. Some one must have accidentally kicked me in the head. I was unconscious for a time, I don’t know how long, and when I came to I was lying in a pool of water. More water was coming. I got to my feet and made my way to a house further up. There was already a crowd of people on the roof, and I joined them.
This was Tuesday morning, and until afternoon we stayed on that roof while the water rose around us and rushed past us. We could not bear to look a the ugly, threatening waters carrying the houses by, with people on the roofs and in the water, animals, vehicles and human beings all mixed up and being tossed around.
I saw a man and a woman on one roof with four children. I suppose they were a family. The man went down into the house and brought up several chairs. He broke them up, made them into a raft and lashed the children to it. The raft was sent spinning in one direction and the man and woman without anything to keep them afloat were thrown in another.
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