The Great Galveston Disaster / Containing a Full and Thrilling Account of the Most Appalling Calamity of Modern Times Including Vivid Descriptions of the Hurricane and Terrible Rush of Waters; Immense Destruction of Dwellings, Business Houses, Churches, and Loss of Thousands of Human Lives; Thrilling Tales of Heroic Deeds; Panic-Stricken Multitudes and Heart-Rending Scenes of Agony; Frantic Efforts to Escape a Horrible Fate; Separation of Loved Ones, etc., etc.; Narrow Escapes from the Jaws of Death; Terrible Sufferings of the Survivors; Vandals Plundering Bodies of the Dead; Wonderful Exhibitions of Popular Sympathy; Millions of Dollars Sent for the Relief of the Stricken Sufferers

by Paul Lester

BURYING THE DEAD.

“After arriving at Texas City we had to wait two or three hours for a boat, and during the time a number of the party walked down the beach and discovered and buried the bodies of eight men, women and children. A memorandum was taken describing as well as possible the people buried, and a headboard put up with a number corresponding to the one in the book. We left Texas City at 3.30 Tuesday evening, arriving at Galveston at 9.30.

“While on the way over we discovered the bodies of several people and quite a number of horses and cows, and as we got off the boat, just under the wharf was a pile of twenty or twenty-five drowned people. Just after leaving the wharf we saw the remains of seven people which were being prepared for cremation. The town is under martial law, and on my way up to the city I was hailed by guards three different times, but after explaining I was permitted to proceed.

“I do not think the conditions at Galveston have been over-drawn by the newspaper reports. In fact, it is more deplorable than any words or picture could portray to the mind. Before we arrived several parties had been shot for robbing the dead and looting houses. Some of our party walked down the beach and found a couple of white men who were breaking open and robbing the trunks which had floated ashore, taking the garments from them and drying them on the grass. These trunks contained all kinds of family wearing apparel.

“We found that all the insurance men of Galveston and their immediate families were safe excepting two married sisters of Mr. Harris, who were drowned with their eight children. They were drowned in their own yards and the bodies afterward recovered and buried there. The loss to the insurance companies from a financial standpoint will be very heavy on account of the cancellation of policies under which there is now no liability, the houses having been destroyed. Again, a great many people who are indebted to the insurance agents cannot pay for the reason that they have lost everything.