The Fire in King Street--Recollections--The Old Coffee House
Corner--The Stores in King Street--The Old Masonic Hall--The
St. John Hotel--Its Early Days--The Bell Tower--King Square--
A Night of Horror--The Vultures at Work--Plundering the
Destitute.
The fire entered King Street in the western side from Germain and
Canterbury Streets. It began by burning down Lawton & Vassie's brick
store, erected on the site which contained the famous Bragg building.
This stout building and Bowes & Evan's premises were soon buried in the
common ruin. The fire went along King Street, destroying Mr. Sharp's dry
goods store, Jas. Adams & Co's., James Manson's magnificent palace,
including his safe and all his valuable papers, John K. Storey's and
Magee Bros., Imperial Block. This last place is quite historic. This
block was erected in 1852, by the late John Gillis. It was built on the
site where the memorable coffee house stood. Here of an evening for
years and years the old men of the place used to sit and gossip and
smoke and sip their toddy. Here in 1815 they met to learn the news of
the war between France and England, and read the story of Waterloo four
or five months after it was fought and won. In this sort of Shakspeare
tavern, the leading merchants of the day met and chatted over large
sales, and compared notes. Here a verbal commercial agency was
established, and here delightful old gossips, like busy Sam Pepys and
garrulous old busybodies, like Johnson's Bozzy, met and told each other
all about everybody else's affairs. What a time these old fellows had
every night sitting there in that quaint old coffee house, chatting and
smoking, smoking and chatting again. And there were Ben Jonsons in those
days, who wrote dramatic pieces and showed them to their friends over a
cup of hot spiced rum. And poets too, full of the tender passion, sighed
out hexameters of love in that old coffee house so dear to some of the
men we meet to-day who lost everything in the flames on that dark
Wednesday in June. Ah, yes, the grand old coffee house was torn down in
1852 to make room for the handsome pile of stone and brick which
perished only the other day. The corner is again bare, and the few who
remember the coffee house are fast passing away.
[Illustration: The Burland Desbarats Lith. Co. Montreal
KING STREET.]
The fire now gained great headway, and soon it was seen taking
prodigious leaps, going ahead, and then seemingly to dart back again and
finish what it had already begun. The people everywhere were in the
wildest state of excitement. In the back streets the fire was
progressing and destroying the residences of the men who were trying to
save their business property in the marts of commerce. People sent car
loads of their more valuable goods to places which appeared to be safe,
but which turned out in the end to be of only temporary security. Men
had their stores burned at four and five o'clock, and their goods burned
at seven and eight o'clock. It was only putting off the evil for a few
brief hours. Cartmen charged wildly and exorbitantly--some having to
pay as high as fifty dollars to have carted away a cartload of stuff. On
every roof in King Street clerks and employers stood with hose and
buckets of water, but nothing that man could do or devise held the
flames at bay, or kept them off for the brief space of a moment. The
fire was determined on a clean sweep, and despite the most strenuous
exertions it had its own way, and baffled the efforts of those who
attempted to stay its fierce will. Beek's corner, lately in the
occupancy of H. R. Smith, bookseller, and a perfect feeder of a fire
like this, was an easy prey, and with a loud roar its rafters fell, and
a well-known corner was no more. Mullin's shoe store, a building of
similar construction, went down in another moment, and now the only
brick building in the block from Canterbury Street to Germain Street was
attacked by the fire. This was Pine's brick building, a fine structure
which several years ago Mr. George Jury Pine built, and in which I. & F.
Burpee commenced business, and George Stewart, of Stewart & White, began
trade. Messrs. Della, Torre & Co. occupied No. 30, and Geo. Stewart,
Jr., Druggist, held the other store, No. 32. The present owner of the
building, Stephen Whittaker, of Fredericton, had lately begun the
erection of a spacious rear addition, and improvements on a liberal
scale had been commenced in the upper stories. The rest of the building
was known as the Russell House. This building went to pieces about six
o'clock. The photograph rooms were destroyed before Pine's building
went, and the flames sped quickly, carrying before them the stores of
Bardsley Bros., Scott & Binning, W. K. Crawford, Geo. Salmon, and
Hanington Bros.' drug store, formerly Fellows & Co.'s establishment on
Foster's Corner, corner King and Germain Streets. The contents of this
store were quickly snapped up by the fire, and pills and plasters, soaps
and perfumes were spilled about in hopeless profusion and confusion. Mr.
T. H. Hall's twin buildings were across the street, but a barrier like
that was an easy jump for the infuriated flames. They leaped into the
windows, attacked the wood-work, and with a strong pull the two splendid
stone buildings were borne to the ground, and thousands of dollars'
worth of property lay scattered about in all directions. Mr. Hall
occupied the corner store as a book-store, and T. L. Coughlan had the
other. Dr. J. M. C. Fiske, dentist held the room overhead.[B] The Gordon
House, Fred. S. Skinner's grocery store, a row of wooden shanties,
Landry's brick building, with a rich stock of organs in it, Logan,
Lindsay & Co.'s large grocery, A. & J. Hay's, Geo. Nixon's, Wm. Warn's
bath-rooms, W. H. Watson's, Geo. Suffren's, W. H. Patterson's, Taylor &
Dockrill's, George Sparrow's, R. McAndrew's, and the United States
Hotel, only lived a short time in the very heart of the fire.
[Illustration: PINE'S BRICK BUILDING KING ST., THE ONLY BRICK BUILDING
BETWEEN CANTERBURY AND GERMAIN STS.]
The fire closed here for a moment, engaging a building dear from long
and good service to the people of St. John, and eminently historical in
its way. The United States Hotel, as Mr. Hinch, the photographer, called
it, when he took possession of it a few years since, was known for many
years as the old Masonic Hall. It stood on the corner of King Street and
Charlotte Street, and was commenced by the Free and Accepted Masons in
1816. It was decided to erect this Temple of Masonry at a meeting of the
craft held April 1, 1816. The lot of land was leased from the
corporation of Trinity Church, and on the 28th September following the
corner-stone was laid, on which was inscribed the following:--
"This stone of the Masonic Hall was laid on 28th Sept., 1816, of the era
of Masonry 5816, and the reign of George the Third, King of the United
Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, in the mayoralty of John Robinson,
Esq., by Thomas Wetmore, Esq., H.M. Attorney-General of N.B., as Grand
Master, substitute of John Pike, Esq,. Grand Master of the Society of
Masons, Nova Scotia, and the jurisdiction thereof."
[Illustration: BELL TOWER AND KING SQUARE.]
The movement was not successful in a pecuniary sense, for in 1819 the
building was sold at sheriffs sale, at suit of James Hendricks. The
purchaser was Israel Lawson. Mr. Lawson had the building completed, and
leased the third or upper story to the Masons. The room was 60 feet by
30 feet, with two large ante-rooms. It was in this room that all the
concerts, balls, public parties, and public meetings given in the city
were held for many years. Up to 1836 the house was known as the Masonic
Hall, but after this year its name was changed. The St. John Hotel
Company was formed, and the building was purchased from Mr. Lawson and
converted into a hotel. It was called the "St. John Hotel," and Mr.
Cyrus Stockwell father of the Honourable Mr. Stockwell, editor of the
_Boston Journal_, opened it on May 24th, 1837. He was its first
proprietor. A copy of the company's original seal is given below. It was
made of brass, and was two inches in diameter.
[Illustration]
This was the first hotel in St. John. It was here that Governor-General
Poulet Thompson and Lord Elgin stopped, and all the notables who from
time to time visited the city. In 1840, Mr. Stockwell retired, and
Messrs. W. & J. Scammell succeeded him in the management of the hotel.
These enterprising gentlemen set to work at once to remodel the
building, and they soon had it in splendid working order. The same
energy which the present firm of Scammell Bros. throw into their
business, was characteristic of the old firm of Scammell Bros. in 1840.
In 1851, W. & J. Scammell left the St. John Hotel, and took up their
quarters in the Waverley House, nearly opposite. The picture which
accompanies this sketch of the old hotel represents the building as
it appeared in 1837. It is taken from an old picture, and as but two or
three copies were known to exist before the late fire, it is a question
now if more then one copy was saved. The old St. John Hotel is full of
associations, pleasurable in every case, to travellers who used to come
to St. John thirty and forty years ago. Even in 1858, when Messrs.
Whitney & Adams kept it, it was still a home for the stranger. There was
a freedom about its old rooms, and a positive luxuriance which one looks
for in vain in the hotels of our later days. About 1861-62, people used
to sit in Ned Sharland's book-store, which was on the ground-flat, and
sketch the Bell-tower, which was then certainly "a thing of beauty,"
even if Mr. Warner found it the reverse in 1874, when he climbed up to
the triumphal arch and found it was made of wood, painted and sanded,
instead of solid stone, as he thought it was. This bell-tower was
erected in 1851, and the large bell which for years tolled out that fire
was at hand, was made in 1852, and came from Meneely's, West Troy, New
York. Before that day, men struck a gong from a scaffold whenever there
was a fire. The tower was useful even in its latter days, if its beauty
had departed three years ago. The cut which we supply will give the
reader at a distance some idea of the old tower, as it appeared in its
lusty young days. When the city comes to be built up again, the site of
the late hotel must not be forgotten. It is eminently adapted for an
hotel. It is centrally located, and has a frontage of 120 feet on King
Street, by 100 feet on Charlotte Street. King Square did much to stay
the onward march of the fire. It was a haven of rest for those weary
ones who were flying from the flames, with the few things they had saved
from the burning. It was the camping ground of the soldiery, and the
hospital bed of the sick and wounded, who were borne to the fresh grass,
and laid there until help was brought to them. The Square, the first few
days of the fire, was filled with furniture, and books, and household
utensils. It was in this square that half-famished women, that night,
hugged their little ones to their hearts, and rocked them, hungry and
cold, on the sward till they went to sleep, only to awaken again and cry
for something to eat. It was here that women gathered into slips the
flying feathers that danced upon the grass and were the playthings of
the wind, trying to save enough of what remained to make a rest for
their heads. It was here they sat with wildly staring eyes, looking out
into the night, while all around them the embers flew about, and the
heavens were red with the sporting flames. It was before this that the
Bell-tower fell with a deafening crash, and many a heart quailed in the
Square, for this told that another historic fragment was swept away, and
that the terrible fire was near at hand. Sobbing children ceased their
wailing for a time, and feeble mothers prayed that God in His mercy
might avert the calamity, and stay the warring flames. There was no more
sleep for the tired ones. They must wander about, ringing their hands
and crying aloud in their awful despair. Even men who had faced a
thousand dangers, quailed before the advance of the fire. The streets
were alive with hurrying pedestrians. Horses were driven at breakneck
speed, and the clattering hoofs told that danger was at hand. Human
vultures stood, with their "pickers and stealers," ready to pounce upon
everything that could be seized, and the presence of an appalling danger
did not deter them from plundering the unfortunate and the destitute. It
was the old war again, of the strong against the weak and powerless. A
female vampire helped a widow lady to gather her little things together
in a bundle, while her children stole the silver and jewelry, and made
off with their plunder. Rough half-grown men stopped children in the
streets, and snatched from their arms the treasured fragments from a
broken home, which they were trying to rescue from the elemental
spoiler. Loafers and thieves held high carnival, and despite the agony
which was felt on all sides, these miscreants never for an instant
forgot that they were thieves, or neglected to ply their calling when
chance threw anything in their way. All night they roamed the streets,
and thrived on the misfortunes of others. Ask them for assistance, and
they knocked you down. Give them something to hold a minute, and they
made off with it. The vilest scum that ever filled a penitentiary
stalked abroad that night, and their lawlessness but added to the horror
of the hour.
[Illustration: The Burland Desbarats Lith. Co. Montreal
VIEW OF KING ST., SHOWING ST. JOHN HOTEL, 1837.]
[Illustration: The Burland Desbarats Lith. Co. Montreal
NORTH SIDE KING ST. AND BELL TOWER.]
FOOTNOTES:
[B] The Orangemen of St. John District met in this hall.