During Friday night and early Saturday morning a large number of small pieces of bodies, and several heads, were discovered, and the trunk of a body which was identified as that of Mr. Murdoch. The remains were taken in charge by an undertaker.
Identifying the Bodies in the Morgue.
Identifizirung der Leichen in der Morgue.
Many of the bodies were so mangled and charred that it was impossible to identify them, and it was determined by the Board of Aldermen to bury these at the public expense. The scenes at the Morgue and the old market on Saturday morning were, if possible, more heartrending and horrible than anything that had occurred in those places since the burning of the theatre. The undertakers’ wagons rattled up to the door of the old market by dozens, [!-- blank page --] [!-- original location of illustration --] and the coffins of stained and polished wood, studded with silver nails, were ranged in rows on the market floor, beside the black, gnarled things that had been human bodies. Outside a motley crowd of men, women, and boys pressed close to the doors and tried to get past the police lines in order to witness the work of putting the stiffened and distorted bodies into the narrow coffins. Wandering among the ghastly rows was the usual throng of sight-seers and mourners searching for friends.
Soon after one o’clock the last coffin was taken from the old market, and the driver who carried it hurried away after the others. The crowd around the door took a last glance at the blackened floors inside, as though the horrible place had fascinated them, and then chased the wagons and carriages that were going to join the procession.
The Funeral.
At a quarter before two o’clock the gleam of bayonets appeared in Schermerhorn street, and the winds bore fitfully the strains of a dirge played by a military band. The head of the procession was nearing the point of establishment of the right of the line. At Flatbush avenue it halted for ten minutes only, while the disposition of the various parts of the procession was perfected. The Twenty-third Regiment, that had marched up in hollow square formation, opened and rested at an “order arms,” while the Forty-seventh Regiment passed through and took the right of the line, headed by its splendid band. Then the hearses and undertakers’ wagons were broken from single to double column, and the Twenty-third Regiment was placed as a guard of honor, surrounding this portion of the mournful cortege. The other necessary dispositions were quietly effected, and then the march was resumed, with the procession in the following order:
Squad of Mounted Police—Sergeant Johnson.
Alderman Fisher and Supervisor Quimby of Committees—in carriage.
Forty-seventh Regiment Band.
Forty-seventh Regiment.
Detachment Fourteenth Regiment, without arms.
Gatling Battery, without piece.
Conterno’s Band.
Twenty-third Regiment as Guard of Honor, leading and flanking first hearses.
Hearses—Seventeen.
Forty-five Undertakers’ Wagons, with from one to four coffins each.
Carriages with Relatives and Friends.
Carriages with Ministers and Officials.
Thirteenth Regiment and Drum Corps.
Near Bergen street the dirge which the band had been playing up to that point ceased, and the roll of twenty-four muffled tenor drums marked the time for the steps of the military. Solemnly impressive as had been the music of the band it seemed infinitely less effective than the roll of the drums. The former had the color of melody, even though full of sadness, but the latter impressed itself on the heart as a monotone of sobs. The air grew heavier with the weight of those measured pulsations of half-voiced grief. Along both sidewalks moved steadily, keeping step with the procession, a silent multitude. There was no hurrying, no conversation to beguile the weary way; only a sullen resistance to the frenzy of the gale.
The drums ceased, and from the military band wailed forth another dirge more weirdly sad than that first played. A trembling, thrilling cry, as of a stricken soul, voiced by a single cornet, awoke, a harmonic wail, in hearing which, one could not repress a shudder. Again the music ceased, and the terrible roll of the muffled drums began, mingled with the shriekings of the storm.