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

CLUNG TO THEIR PROPERTY.

“Several places they extended rescue and the people declined to go expressing the belief that their peril was not so great, and preferring to remain with their property. Sometimes they would make the second trip to such places and sometimes the occupants would be saved and in other instances they had tarried too long. Their plan was to carry people into places where they could wade out and leave them, going back to bring others to shallow water and on the return again carrying them further in.

“In cases where parents had been carried out to wading water and deposited, they would stand there instead of pushing on, looking back for their children, and it sometimes happened that the children and parents both went down while one waited for the other, when, if the parents had pushed on after they had reached wading water, all might have been saved.

“One of the last loads carried out was about to land in front of St. Mary’s Infirmary, when a piece of falling timber struck the boat and capsized it. They had eight or nine people in the boat, and when they succeeded in righting it they could find only two or three.

“Mr. Mennis and a party of about forty people took refuge in a two-story grocery store at Forty-fifth street and Broadway. When the roof went over and the building went to pieces, Mr. Mennis and six others caught on drift. They were driven toward the beach into the gulf, and when the wind veered to the southeast and later south, they were driven across the bay and landed on the mainland near Texas City. Of the seven who made this terrible voyage two died in the course of a day. Mr. Mennis lost his mother and two brothers.

“In the vicinity of Texas City sixty bodies supposed to be from Galveston have been buried. Nearly all were women. There was no means of identification, except possibly by jewelry, which was found on about one-half of the bodies.”

Prof. Fred. W. Mally reached Houston three days after the storm, and in reply to inquiries related some thrilling experiences. He had been out at Booth, in Fort Bend County. He boarded the 7.15 P. M. Santa Fe train.