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

TEARS IN MANY EYES.

“And the two pass on, the one light hearted, the other a smile glistening in his tear dimmed eye, both glad for what was left them. I saw a telegram to a Galveston woman from a sister in Houston with whom she had hardly been on speaking terms for years. It read:

“‘Are you safe? Do you want any money? Come up to Houston and live with us.’

“Is there necessity of comment? I saw neighbors who had been quarreling and saying spiteful things about each other for months, riding down the street in the same buggy, the most loving chums in the world. I saw rival candidates for the same political office catch hold of opposite ends of the same log, and with a ‘heave ho!’ toss it up out of the way of wagons and pedestrians, each doing the work for humanity’s sake.

“Social distinction is wiped out. I heard the banker tell his story of the storm to his stableman with as much vim and gusto as though hobnobbing with his heaviest depositor. White and colored stopped to make inquiries of each other and shake hands. I saw a blind mendicant, a continual object of charity, on the corner of Twenty-first and Market, and heard of hundreds upon hundreds of great, strong, useful men who went down with the flood. Life is stranger than fiction, but it does seem an ironical providence that saves the halt and the maimed and takes away the useful.”

Police Officer W. H. Plummer is the happy possesser of a four-oared boat which he has christened “Cyclone Rescue,” in honor of its work in the storm. The boat is constructed on the pattern of what is known as an Eastern pod, such as is used by the lobster fishermen of Maine. The boat was built to withstand the rough seas, and was so constructed with two air-tight compartments as to be used as a lifeboat. This boat, with lashed oars, was kept by Officer Plummer in his yard, corner of Seventh and Church streets, one of the first districts to suffer from the invasion of the destructive Gulf on the fatal day of the storm.