Samuel Thomas, the gangway man, whose life was saved by the forethought of Taylor, says that the scene on the burning ship was awful. The groans and cries of the dying, for whom nothing could be done, were horrible. He describes a woman as being burned to death with a living babe in her arms. He says that it seemed as if the whole world was afire.
CONSUL AYME’S STATEMENT
The inflammable material in the forepart of the ship that would have ignited that part of the vessel was thrown overboard by him and the other two uninjured men. The Grappler, the telegraph company’s ship, was seen opposite the Usine Guerin, and disappeared as if blown up by a submarine explosion. The captain’s body was subsequently found by a boat from the Suchet.
Consul Ayme, of Guadeloupe, who, as already stated, had hastened to Fort de France on hearing of the terrible event, tells the story of the disaster in the following words:
“Thursday morning the inhabitants of the city awoke to find heavy clouds shrouding Mont Pelee crater. All day Wednesday horrid detonations had been heard. These were echoed from St. Thomas on the north to Barbados on the south. The cannonading ceased on Wednesday night, and fine ashes fell like rain on St. Pierre. The inhabitants were alarmed, but Governor Mouttet, who had arrived at St. Pierre the evening before, did everything possible to allay the panic.
“The British steamer Roraima reached St. Pierre on Thursday with ten passengers, among whom were Mrs. Stokes and her three children, and Mrs. H. J. Ince. They were watching the rain of ashes, when, with a frightful roar and terrific electric discharges, a cyclone of fire, mud and steam swept down from the crater over the town and bay, sweeping all before it and destroying the fleet of vessels at anchor off the shore. There the accounts of the catastrophe so far obtainable cease. Thirty thousand corpses are strewn about, buried in the ruins of St. Pierre, or else floating, gnawed by sharks, in the surrounding seas. Twenty-eight charred, half-dead human beings were brought here. Sixteen of them are already dead, and only four of the whole number are expected to recover.”
A WOMAN’S EXPERIENCE ON THE “RORAIMA”
Margaret Stokes, the 9 year old daughter of the late Clement Stokes, of New York, who, with her mother, a brother aged 4 and a sister aged 3 years, was on the ill-fated steamer Roraima, was saved from that vessel, but is not expected to live. Her nurse, Clara King, tells the following story of her experience:
She says she was in her stateroom, when the steward of the Roraima called out to her:
“Look at Mont Pelee.”