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

LAST TRAIN OVER THE BRIDGE.

Mr. J. T. Grimes, of near Brandon, has a fine farm and is a substantial and reliable citizen highly esteemed and respected. He was in Galveston during the hurricane and related a remarkable experience. He said:

“I left here Friday and got there Saturday evening. The storm was on when we got there. Our train was the last that went over the bridge before it went down. The water was then rising rapidly and nearly over the tracks. The conductor asked if any one had ever seen it that high before. Nobody had. A carload of cattle that followed us on the bridge went down with the bridge.”

“How came you to go to Galveston?” asked the reporter.

Mr. Grimes hesitated, as if considering, then said: “Well, sir, it was this way: I was sitting on the gallery with a baby in my arms—the child of that man standing there, whose wife cooks for me. Suddenly it was just like some one came to me and told me to go to Galveston. It came so powerfully I sprang up and handed the baby to its mother and told her I must go, and ordered my clothes prepared for the trip. In two hours I was on the way.”

“Did you have any idea what you were summoned to Galveston for?”

“No; only I knew there was some disaster threatening my children. I did not know what it was, but I could not refrain from going.”

Asked further about the trip to Galveston, he said the passengers got into the depot, but he never saw or heard of any of the train crew, and he thought they all must have perished. “I got a negro to show me the way to where my daughter, Mrs. Chilton, lived. The water was then all over the city and rising rapidly. When we got to Eighth street, my son-in-law here, Stufflebram, called out to me across the street. He had seen and recognized me. I went over and we started on. There was a lot of timber and driftwood floating, and some people along the way were pulling all of it in the houses they could get.