“Members of my family asked me if there was no escape. I answered, ‘No; this means death to us all.’ My wife with blanched face said, ‘Won’t our big strong house stand?’ I replied deliberately: ‘No, Maggie; no building can stand this awful jam, and we are all lost.’
“The press of the heaving, surging mass rolled steadily on, and in less than three minutes, as nearly as I can estimate time, from the moment I saw the front of the angry torrent it was upon us. The great Municipal building above me fell with a crash. The stately dwelling of my neighbor, John Dibert, was broken to atoms. I walked rapidly to the southeast window, and saw the front of the brick dwelling above and adjoining mine, crushed to rubbish. Several persons were floating directly down Main street, in front of me; a large frame building directly opposite me careened, at the attic windows of which I saw a number of ladies, one of whom held an infant in her arms; there was a crash, a sensation of falling, a consciousness that I was in the water, and all was dark. A moment later, I felt the press of a heavy shock, a sense of excruciating pain, involving my right breast, shoulder and arm. The thought came upon me that I was being crushed to death, that I could not long endure the agony I then suffered, and that death would come soon. I watched for the change, expecting in a moment to know the reality of eternity. I heard the moan of my eldest son, who was at my side when the crash came.
“I felt myself struggling, with my left hand clutching at something, I know not what. I heard the voice of my youngest son, as I thought, imploring me to aid him. I told him I was powerless to succor him. A moment later I realized that he was endeavoring to have me reach a higher elevation, when I told him my whole right side was crushed; he came to my relief and aided me in getting upon a fragment of the slate roof. A moment after, a little boy whom I had sheltered, appeared and informed me that my wife was drowned; he had barely made this announcement when I saw my only daughter, June, rise up out of the water among the debris to perhaps her waist, and immediately sink out of sight. As she sank, I saw my wife rise out of the water to about her waist, and almost immediately sink out of sight; a moment after, they rose together, and I saw my son Winter, a lad of twenty years, a strong, robust person, and heard him say, ‘Ma, hold on to me, and I can save you.’ I was lying on my side, perhaps twenty or twenty-five feet distant from where my wife, daughter and son were struggling, the skin torn from the right side of my face, the blood flowing profusely from the wound, the skin torn from the back of my left hand, my right collar-bone broken, my shoulder-blade fractured, the ribs crushed in upon my lung, my right arm from shoulder to wrist lying limp on my side, powerless to give aid or assistance to my loved ones. At this moment a young man seemed to shoot up and out of the debris at my side; I realized that he was an acquaintance, but could not name him. I at once, however, addressed him, saying, ‘Young man, won’t you go and help Winter save my wife and daughter? I am helpless; my whole right side and arm are crushed.’ He made no reply, but
THE BATTLE WITH THE WATERS.
at once hastened across the debris, and aided in relieving my wife from the timbers in which she was pinioned. Then he immediately disappeared from my sight; but I afterward learned he was Harry Philips, who was reared in Johnstown, was then practicing his profession of dentistry in Pittsburg; was home on a visit, and in the house of Dr. L. T. Beam, and was the only person who escaped with his life, while his mother, niece, nephew and brother-in-law were lost in the flood. My eldest son had disappeared. I believed I had heard his dying moan. All the other inmates of my house at the time it was struck, were now floating on different fragments of houses, and being rushed with fearful velocity in a westerly course to and across the Stony Creek River.