One of the most thrilling incidents of the disaster was the performance
of A. J. Leonard, whose family reside in Morrellville. He was at work,
and hearing that his house had been swept away, determined at all
hazards to ascertain the fate of his family. The bridges having been
carried away, he constructed a temporary raft, and clinging to it as
close as a cat to the side of a fence, he pushed his frail craft out in
the raging torrent and started on a chase which, to all who were
watching, seemed to mean an embrace in death.
Heedless of cries "For God's sake, go back, you will be drowned," and
"Don't attempt it," he persevered. As the raft struck the current he
threw off his coat and in his shirt sleeves braved the stream. Down
plunged the boards and down went Leonard, but as it rose he was seen
still clinging. A mighty shout arose from the throats of the hundreds on
the banks, who were now deeply interested, earnestly hoping he would
successfully ford the stream.
Down again went his bark, but nothing, it seemed, could shake Leonard
off. The craft shot up in the air apparently ten or twelve feet, and
Leonard stuck to it tenaciously. Slowly but surely he worked his boat to
the other side of the stream, and after what seemed an awful suspense he
finally landed, amid ringing cheers of men, women, and children.
The scenes at Heanemyer's planing-mill at Nineveh, where the dead bodies
are lying, are never to be forgotten. The torn, bruised, and mutilated
bodies of the victims are lying in a row on the floor of the
planing-mill, which looks more like the field of Bull Run after that
disastrous battle than a workshop. The majority of the bodies are nude,
their clothing having been torn off. All along the river bits of
clothing--a tiny shoe, a baby dress, a mother's evening wrapper, a
father's coat--and, in fact, every article of wearing apparel
imaginable, may be seen hanging to stumps of trees and scattered on the
bank.
One of the most pitiful sights of this terrible disaster came to notice
when the body of a young lady was taken out of the Conemaugh River. The
woman was apparently quite young, though her features were terribly
disfigured. Nearly all the clothing excepting the shoes was torn off
the body. The corpse was that of a mother, for, although cold in death,
she clasped a young male babe, apparently not more than a year old,
tightly in her arms. The little one was huddled close up to the face of
the mother, who, when she realized their terrible fate, had evidently
raised it to her lips to imprint upon its lips the last kiss it was to
receive in this world. The sight forced many a stout heart to shed
tears. The limp bodies, with matted hair, some with holes in their
heads, eyes knocked out, and all bespattered with blood were a ghastly
spectacle.
Mr. J. M. Fronheiser, one of the Superintendents in the Cambria Iron
Works, lived on Main Street. His house was one of the first to go, and
he himself, his wife, two daughters, son, and baby were thrown into the
raging torrent. His wife and eldest daughter were lost. He, with the
baby, reached a place of safety, and his ten-year-old boy and
twelve-year-old girl floated near enough to be reached. He caught the
little girl, but she cried:
"Let me go, papa, and save brother; my leg is broken and my foot is
caught below."
When he told her he was determined to rescue her, she exclaimed:
"Then, papa, get a sharp knife and cut my leg off. I can stand it."
The little fellow cried to his father: "You can't save me, papa. Both
my feet are caught fast, and I can't hold out any longer. Please get a
pistol and shoot me."
Captain Gageby, of the army, and some neighbors helped to rescue both
children. The girl displayed Spartan fortitude and pluck. All night long
she lay in a bed without a mattress or medical attention in a garret,
the water reaching to the floor below, without a murmur or a whimper. In
the morning she was carried down-stairs, her leg dangling under her, but
when she saw her father at the foot of the stairs, she whispered to
Captain Gageby:
"Poor papa; he is so sad." Then, turning to her father, she threw a kiss
with her hands and laughingly said, "Good morning, papa; I'm all right."
The Pennsylvania Railroad Company's operators at Switch Corner, "S. Q.,"
which is near Sang Hollow, tell thrilling stories of the scenes
witnessed by them on Friday afternoon and evening. Said one of them:
"In order to give you an idea of how the tidal wave rose and fell, let
me say that I kept a measure and timed the rise and fall of the water,
and in forty-eight minutes it fell four and a half feet.
"I believe that when the water goes down about seventy-five children and
fifty grown persons will be found among the weeds and bushes in the
bend of the river just below the tower.
"There the current was very strong, and we saw dozens of people swept
under the trees, and I don't believe that more than one in twenty came
out on the other side."
"They found a little girl in white just now," said one of the other
operators.
"O God!" said the chief operator. "She isn't dead, is she?"
"Yes; they found her in a clump of willow bushes, kneeling on a board,
just about the way we saw her when she went down the river." Turning to
me he said:
"That was the saddest thing we saw all day yesterday. Two men came down
on a little raft, with a little girl kneeling between them, and her
hands raised and praying. She came so close to us we could see her face
and that she was crying. She had on a white dress and looked like a
little angel. She went under that cursed shoot in the willow bushes at
the bend like all the rest, but we did hope she would get through
alive."
"And so she was still kneeling?" he said to his companion, who had
brought the unwelcome news.
"She sat there," was the reply, "as if she was still praying, and there
was a smile on her poor little face, though her mouth was full of mud."
Driving through the mountains a correspondent picked up a ragged little
chap not much more than big enough to walk. From his clothing he was
evidently a refugee.
"Where are your folks?" he was asked.
"We're living at Aunty's now."
"Did you all get out?"
"Oh! we're all right--that is, all except two of sister's babies. Mother
and little sister wasn't home, and they got out all right."
"Where were you?"
"Oh! I was at sister's house. We was all in the water and fire. Sister's
man--her husband, you know--took us up-stairs, and he punched a hole
through the roof, and we all climbed out and got saved."
"How about the babies?"
"Oh! sister was carrying two of them in her arms, and the bureau hit her
and knocked them out, so they went down."
The child had unconsciously caught one of the oddest and most
significant tricks of speech that have arisen from the calamity. Nobody
here speaks of a person's having been drowned, or killed, or lost, or
uses any other of the general expressions for sudden death. They have
simply "gone down." Everybody here seems to avoid harsh words in
referring to the possible affliction of another. Euphonistic phrases are
substituted for plain questions. Two old friends met for the first time
since the disaster.
"I'm glad to see you," exclaimed the first. "Are you all right?"
"Yes, I'm doing first rate," was the reply.
The first friend looked awkwardly about a moment, and then asked with
suppressed eagerness:
"And--and your family--are they all--well?"
There was a world of significance in the hesitation before the last
word.
"Yes. Thank God! not one of them went down."
A man who looked like a prosperous banker, and who had evidently come
from a distance drove through the mountains toward South Fork. On the
way he met a handsome young man in a silk hat, mounted on a mule. The
two shook hands eagerly.
"Have you anything?"
"Nothing. What have you?"
"Nothing."
The younger man turned about and the two rode on silently through the
forest road. Inquiry later developed the fact that the banker-looking
man was really a banker whose daughter had been lost from one of the
overwhelmed trains. The young man was his son. Both had been searching
for some clue to the young woman's fate.