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

CRUSHED BY A PIECE OF TIMBER.

One poor woman was carrying her child and its head was crushed by a piece of timber. It did not even whimper, yet she carried the dead infant at her breast for three long hours before it was torn from her grasp. When one sees the debris piled twenty feet high, in many places on the backbone of the island—that is, along Q street, running east and west—and when one sees the broad prairies for miles and miles covered with the wreckage that came from Galveston across the bay, the wonder with him will be that anything out on the waters that fearful night escaped to look, not tell, the story of that fearful night. For few can tell it; all look it.

Something of the strength of the winds and waves can be known when it is stated that along the beach at Texas cities I saw dead turtles even. Fish floated dead in the bay. They may have come from some wrecked fishing smack, and I am inclined to take this view of it, but there they were, covering a large space with their dead bodies. There were thousands of rats floating about. I saw even dead snakes along the shores. The chickens which lined the beach along the mainland were entirely denuded of their feathers. Not a buzzard or bird was to be seen. Not a mosquito was heard. The wind had carried all winged things away.

Down in some parts of the debris the planks and beams and sills of houses had been thrown together with such force that they were driven into each other and made as solid a mass as the most skilled workmen could join two pieces of timber. The foreman of one of the working gangs said it was impossible to remove certain portions of the mass except by clipping it away with axes or by burning it. If such a wind had struck Dallas or any other town in the State, it would not have lasted a moment.

Another thing I have been asked by the people of the interior was why the resort to the ocean as a burial ground was had, and why burning was afterward resorted to. When day broke after that night of horror, the people could not realize the immensity of their woe. It required but a short time for them to know it. The first on the streets were the first greeted by the corpses.

They fled hither and thither, wringing their hands. Others stood still and stared in a dumb way. Some cooler citizens suggested that the bells be rung and the people assembled to grapple with the situation. And lo, there was not a bell in town to sound the alarm. It was suggested that the steam whistles be blown. And lo, there was not a whistle with steam to give it note on all the island. Then they went up and down the streets, crying, “Fall in, people; for God’s sake, fall in.” They got a few people together in this way. As they had gone about, more corpses appeared.