EIGHTH AND MAIN STREETS, LOUISVILLE.
It is related that at the time of the massacre of St. Bartholomew, a Romish captain secured a number of fugitives, among whom he felt satisfied there were some good Catholics. Not being able to distinguish them readily, he referred the perplexing case to a fanatical priest. The response came promptly: “Kill all; the Lord will know his own!”
Interpreters of the inscrutable ways of Providence might find such the only solution for many particulars of the storm. The pious but superstitious folk who believe that all such visitations are for the sins of a people, instead of the result of laws that send the rain alike upon the just and the unjust, might find some perplexity in conning the following cases.
On the next street back of Falls City Hall stood the St. John’s Episcopal Church. The rector, with his little four-year-old boy, was in the study. The rectory and the church were completely destroyed, and the rector and his child were killed. In an adjoining building, ten or eleven men were playing cards. The house was demolished, but not one of the players was seriously hurt. The preacher perished; the idlers were saved—herein is food for reflection.
Tierney’s saloon was on Eleventh, between Main and Market. The ice-box saved him and four other men from being crushed. They crowded beside it, and crawled out uninjured. The pastor and the useful laundry girls perished; the saloon-keeper and his patrons survived.
The Catholic buildings at Seventeenth and Broadway were Father Desney’s residence, the Sisters’ Home, the Church of the Sacred Heart, and the parochial school. All these were wrecked by the wind, and Sister Pius was killed. There is a story that, amid utter ruin, the image of the Virgin was left standing, untouched by harm. Let the devout remember that a saloon-keeper obtained an equal deliverance.
Elmer Barnes and several others ran into Eckerle’s saloon, 1001 West Market, and securely closed the door. The building fell with a crash, and the men were buried in the ruins. Barnes and Eckerle were overwhelmed by the falling bricks and timber. Eckerle was fearfully injured; Barnes was drawn from the ruins, and died a few hours afterward. The other men were only slightly hurt. If we have had occasion to mention the destruction of one church and of several saloons, it is probably only because saloons are more numerous than churches.
At a grocery store at the corner of Sixteenth and Magazine streets the owner and five others were standing at the bar in the back part of the store. A dreadful roaring sound was heard, and the house rocked back and forth. The owner’s wife and children screamed and ran out the back way. Almost instantly the rear wall of the building fell. The six men rushed to escape by the front door, but the wind closed it with such force that it could not be opened. The floor beneath gave way, and three men were dropped into the cellar and pinned among the ruins. The other three escaped through a side window. Instantly a fire kindled and took hold on the imprisoned men. Their cries were awful, while their escaped companions witnesssed the horrible cremation and were powerless to render aid.