Mr. William Henry Smith, General Manager of the Associated Press, was a
passenger on a railroad train which reached the Conemaugh Valley on the
very day of the disaster. He writes as follows of what he saw:
"The fast line trains that leave Chicago at quarter past three and
Cincinnati at seven P.M. constitute the day-express eastward from
Pittsburg, which runs in two sections. This train left Pittsburg on time
Friday morning, but was stopped for an hour at Johnstown by reports of a
wash-out ahead. It had been raining hard for over sixteen hours, and the
sides of the mountains were covered with water descending into the
valleys. The Conemaugh River, whose bank is followed by the Pennsylvania
Railroad for many miles, looked an angry flood nearly bankfull.
Passengers were interested in seeing hundreds of saw-logs and an
enormous amount of driftwood shoot rapidly by, and the train pursued its
way eastward. At Johnstown there was a long wait, as before stated. The
lower stories of many houses were submerged by the slack-water, and the
inhabitants were looking out of the second-story windows. Horses were
standing up to their knees in water in the streets; a side-track of the
railroad had been washed out; loaded cars were on the bridge to keep it
steady, and the huge poles of the Western Union Telegraph Company,
carrying fifteen wires, swayed badly, and several soon went down. The
two sections ran to Conemaugh, about two miles eastward of Johnstown,
and lay there about three hours, when they were moved on to the highest
ground and placed side by side. The mail train was placed in the rear of
the first section, and a freight train was run onto a side track on the
bank of the Conemaugh. The report was that a bridge had been washed out,
carrying away one track and that the other track was unsafe. There was a
rumor also that the reservoir at South Fork might break. This made most
of the passengers uneasy, and they kept a pretty good look-out for
information. The porters of the Pullman cars remained at their posts,
and comforted the passengers with the assurance that the Pennsylvania
Railroad Company always took care of its patrons. A few gentlemen and
some ladies and children quietly seated themselves, apparently
contented. One gentleman, who was ill, had his berth made up and
retired, although advised not to do so.
"Soon the cry came that the water in the reservoir had broken down the
barrier and was sweeping down the valley. Instantly there was a panic
and a rush for the mountain side. Children were carried and women
assisted by a few who kept cool heads. It was a race for life. There was
seen the black head of the flood, now the monster Destruction, whose
crest was high raised in the air, and with this in view even the weak
found wings for their feet. No words can adequately describe the terror
that filled every breast, or the awful power manifested by the flood.
The round-house had stalls for twenty-three locomotives. There were
eighteen or twenty of these standing there at this time. There was an
ominous crash, and the round-house and locomotives disappeared.
Everything in the main track of the flood was first lifted in air and
then swallowed up by the waters. A hundred houses were swept away in a
few minutes. These included the hotel, stores, and saloons on the front
street and residences adjacent. The locomotive of one of the trains was
struck by a house and demolished. The side of another house stopped in
front of another locomotive and served as a shield. The rear car of the
mail train swung around in the rear of the second section of the
express and turned over on its side. Three men were observed standing
upon it as it floated. The coupling broke, and the car moved out upon
the bosom of the waters. As it would roll the men would shift their
position. The situation was desperate, and they were given up for lost.
Two or three hardy men seized ropes and ran along the mountain side to
give them aid. Later it was reported that the men escaped over some
driftwood as their car was carried near a bank. It is believed there
were several women and children inside the car. Of course they were
drowned. As the fugitives on the mountain side witnessed the awful
devastation they were moved as never before in their lives. They were
powerless to help those seized upon by the waters; the despair of those
who had lost everything in life and the wailing of those whose relatives
or friends were missing filled their breasts with unutterable sorrow.
"The rain continued to fall steadily, but shelter was not thought of.
Few passengers saved anything from the train, so sudden was the cry 'Run
for your lives, the reservoir has broken!'
"Many were without hats, and as their baggage was left on the trains,
they were without the means of relieving their unhappy condition. The
occupants of the houses still standing on the high ground threw them
open to those who had lost all, and to the passengers of the train.
"During the height of the flood, the spectators were startled by the
sound of two locomotive whistles from the very midst of the waters. Two
engineers, with characteristic courage, had remained at their posts, and
while there was destruction on every hand, and apparently no escape for
them, they sounded their whistles. This they repeated at intervals, the
last time with triumphant vigor, as the waters were receding from the
sides of their locomotives. By half-past five the force of the reservoir
water had been spent on the village of Conemaugh, and the Pullman cars
and locomotive of the second section remained unmoved. This was because,
being on the highest and hardest ground, the destructive current of the
reservoir flood had passed between that and the mountain, while the
current of the river did not eat it away. But the other trains had been
destroyed. A solitary locomotive was seen embedded in the mud where the
round-house had stood.
"As the greatest danger had passed, the people of Conemaugh gave their
thoughts to their neighbors of the city of Johnstown. Here was centred
the great steel and iron industries, the pride of Western Pennsylvania,
the Cambria Iron Works being known everywhere. Here were churches,
daily newspapers, banks, dry-goods houses, warehouses, and the
comfortable and well-built homes of twelve thousand people. In the
contemplation of the irresistible force of that awful flood, gathering
additional momentum as it swept on toward the Gulf, it became clear that
the city must be destroyed, and that unless the inhabitants had
telegraphic notice of the breaking of the reservoir they must perish. A
cry of horror went up from the hundreds on the mountain-side, and a few
instinctively turned their steps toward Johnstown. The city was
destroyed. All the mills, furnaces, manufactories, the many and varied
industries, the banks, the residences, all, all were swallowed up before
the shadows of night had settled down upon the earth. Those who came
back by daybreak said that from five thousand to eight thousand had been
drowned. Our hope is that this is an exaggeration, and when the roll is
called most will respond. In the light of this calamity, the destruction
at Conemaugh sinks into insignificance."
Mr. George Johnston, a lumber merchant of Pittsburg, was another
witness. "I had gone to Johnstown," he says, "to place a couple of
orders. I had scarcely reached the town, about three o'clock in the
afternoon, when I saw a bulletin posted up in front of the telegraph
office, around which quite a crowd of men had congregated. I pushed my
way up, and read that the waters were so high in the Conemaugh that it
was feared the three-mile dam, as it was called, would give way. I know
enough about Johnstown to feel that my life was not worth a snap once
that dam gave way. Although the Johnstown people did not seem to pay
much attention to the warning, I was nervous and apprehensive. I had
several parties to see, but concluded to let all but one go until some
later day. So I hurried through with my most urgent transactions and
started for the depot. The Conemaugh had then gotten so high that the
residents of the low-lying districts had moved into upper stories. I
noticed a number of wagons filled with furniture hurrying through the
streets. A few families, either apprehensive of the impending calamity
or driven from their houses by the rising waters, had started for the
surrounding hills. Johnstown, you know, lies in a narrow valley, and
lies principally on the V-shaped point between the converging river and
Stony Creek.
"I was just walking up the steps to the depot when I heard a fearful
roar up the valley. It sounded at first like a heavy train of cars, but
soon became too loud and terrible for that. I boarded a train, and as I
sat at the car window a sight broke before my view that I will remember
to my dying day. Away up the Conemaugh came a yellow wall, whose crest
was white and frothy. I rushed for the platform of the car, not knowing
what I did, and just then the train began to move. Terrified as I was, I
remember feeling that I was in the safest place and I sank back in a
seat. When I looked out again what had been the busy mill yards of the
Cambria Iron Company was a yellow, turbulent sea, on whose churned
currents houses and barns were riding like ships in a brook. The water
rushing in upon the molten metal in the mills had caused deafening
explosions, which, coupled with the roar and grinding of the flood, made
a terrifying din. Turning to the other side and looking on down the
valley, I saw the muddy water rushing through the main streets of the
town. I could see men and horses floundering about almost within call.
House-tops were being filled with white-faced people who clung to each
other and looked terror-stricken upon the rising flood.
"It had all come so quickly that none of them seemed to realize what had
happened. The conductor of my train had been pulling frantically at the
bell-rope, and the train went spinning across the bridge. I sat in my
seat transfixed with horror. Houses were spinning through beneath the
bridge, and I did not know at what moment the structure would melt away
under the train. The conductor kept tugging at the bell-rope and the
train shot ahead again. We seemed to fairly leap over the yellow
torrents, and I wondered for an instant whether we had not left the
rails and were flying through the air. My heart gave a bound of relief
when we dashed into the forest on the hillside opposite the doomed town.
As the train sped along at a rate of speed that made me think the
engineer had gone mad, I took one look back upon the valley. What a
sight it was! The populous valley for miles either way was a seething,
roaring cauldron, through whose boiling surface roofs of houses and the
stand-pipes of mills protruded. The water was fairly piling up in a well
farther up, and I saw the worst had not yet come. Then I turned my eyes
away from the awful sight and tried not to even think until Pittsburg
was reached.
"I cannot see how it is possible for less than five thousand lives to
have been sacrificed in Johnstown alone. At least two-thirds of the town
was swept away. The water came so quickly that escape from the low
districts was impossible. People retreated to the upper floors of their
residences and stores until the water had gotten too deep to allow their
escape. When the big flood came the houses were picked up like
pasteboard boxes or collapsed like egg-shells. The advance of the flood
was black with houses, logs, and other debris, so that it struck
Johnstown with the solid force of a battering-ram. None but
eye-witnesses of the flood can comprehend its size and awfulness as it
came tumbling, roaring down upon the unprotected town."
[Illustration: TYPICAL SCENE IN JOHNSTOWN.]
The appearance of the flood at Sang Hollow, some miles below Johnstown,
is thus pictured by C. W. Linthicum, of Baltimore:
"My train left Pittsburg on Friday morning for Johnstown. The train was
due at Sang Hollow at two minutes after four, but was five minutes late.
At Sang Hollow, just as we were about to pull out, we heard that the
flood was coming. Looking ahead, up the valley, we saw an immense wall
of water thirty feet high, raging, roaring, rushing toward us. The
engineer reversed his engine and rushed back to the hills at full speed,
and we barely escaped the waters. We ran back three hundred yards, and
the flood swept by, tearing up track, telegraph poles, trees, and
houses. Superintendent Pitcairn was on the train. We all got out and
tried to save the floating people. Taking the bell cord we formed a line
and threw the rope out, thus saving seven persons. We could have saved
more, but many were afraid to let go of the debris. It was an awful
sight. The immense volume of water was roaring along, whirling over huge
rocks, dashing against the banks and leaping high into the air, and this
seething flood was strewn with timber, trunks of trees, parts of houses,
and hundreds of human beings, cattle, and almost every living animal.
The fearful peril of the living was not more awful than the horrors of
hundreds of distorted, bleeding corpses whirling along the avalanche of
death. We counted one hundred and seven people floating by and dead
without number. A section of roof came by on which were sitting a woman
and girl. A man named C. W. Heppenstall, of Pittsburg, waded and swam to
the roof. He brought the girl in first and then the woman. They told us
they were not relatives. The woman had lost her husband and four
children, and the girl her father and mother, and entire family. A
little boy came by with his mother. Both were as calm as could be, and
the boy was apparently trying to comfort the mother. They passed
unheeding our proffered help, and striking the bridge below, went down
into the vortex like lead.
"One beautiful girl came by with her hands raised in prayer, and,
although we shouted to her and ran along the bank, she paid no
attention. We could have saved her if she had caught the rope. An old
man and his wife whom we saved said that eleven persons started from
Cambria City on the roof with him, but that the others had dropped off.
"At about eight P. M. we started for New Florence. All along the river
we saw corpses without number caught in the branches of trees and
wedged in corners in the banks. A large sycamore tree in the river
between Sang Hollow and New Florence seemed to draw into it nearly all
who floated down, and they went under the surface at its roots like
lead. When the waters subsided two hundred and nine bodies were found at
the root of this tree. All night the living and the dead floated by New
Florence. At Pittsburg seventy-eight bodies were found on Saturday, and
as many more were seen floating by. Hundreds of people from ill-fated
Johnstown are wandering homeless and starving on the mountain-side. Very
few saved anything, and I saw numbers going down the stream naked. The
suffering within the next few days will be fearful unless prompt relief
is extended."
H. M. Bennett and S. W. Keltz, engineer and conductor of engine No.
1,165, an extra freight, which happened to be lying at South Fork when
the dam broke, tell a graphic story of their wonderful flight and escape
on the locomotive before the advancing flood. At the time mentioned
Bennett and Keltz were in the signal tower at that point awaiting
orders. The fireman and flagman were on the engine, and two brakemen
were asleep in the caboose. Suddenly the men in the tower heard a loud
booming roar in the valley above them. They looked in the direction of
the sound, and were almost transfixed with horror to see two miles
above them a huge black wall of water, at least one hundred and fifty
feet in height, rushing down the valley upon them.
One look the fear-stricken men gave the awful sight, and then they made
a rush for the locomotive, at the same time giving the alarm to the
sleeping brakemen in the caboose with loud cries, but with no avail. It
was impossible to aid them further, however, so they cut the engine
loose from the train, and the engineer, with one wild wrench, threw the
lever wide open, and they were away on a mad race for life. For a moment
it seemed that they would not receive momentum enough to keep ahead of
the flood, and they cast one despairing glance back. Then they could see
the awful deluge approaching in its might. On it came, rolling and
roaring like some Titanic monster, tossing and tearing houses, sheds,
and trees in its awful speed as if they were mere toys. As they looked
they saw the two brakemen rush out of the cab, but they had not time to
gather the slightest idea of the cause of their doom before they, the
car, and signal tower were tossed high in the air, to disappear forever
in engulfing water.
Then with a shudder, as if at last it comprehended its peril, the engine
leaped forward like a thing of life, and speeded down the valley. But
fast as it went, the flood gained upon them. Hope, however, was in the
ascendant, for if they could but get across the bridge below the track
would lean toward the hillside in such a manner that they would be
comparatively safe. In a few breathless moments the shrieking locomotive
whizzed around the curve and they were in sight of the bridge. Horror
upon horrors! Ahead of them was a freight train, with the rear end
almost on the bridge, and to get across was simply impossible! Engineer
Bennett then reversed the lever and succeeded in checking the engine as
they glided across the bridge, and then they jumped and ran for their
lives up the hillside, as the bridge and tender of the locomotive they
had been on were swept away like a bundle of matches in the torrent.