“It is frightful to think of. The bay is still full of floating bodies. Forty-three were counted from the schooner I was on as we went down. Gangs of men are at work all the time under martial law burying as fast as they are cast up.
“The city of Galveston is a wreck. Not a building in the town escaped injury. The people there who went through the storm seemed dazed and in a sort of stupor. All they know is that they want to get away from the spot, and when they get on the mainland they go wild with joy. They are utterly bewildered and demoralized.
ARRESTED FOR ROBBING THE DEAD.
“General McKibben had just arrived when I was there and martial law reigned. I was told that seventy ghouls had been arrested for robbing bodies and that they would be court-martialed and shot. The tramp steamer Kendal Castle is lying high and dry 200 feet from the water’s edge. She is standing on an even keel, just as though she was at sea. General Scurry wanted a boat to go across to Galveston and informed the captain he was under martial law and his boats would be required. The boats were sent and General Scurry went across the bay in the captain’s gig.
“The stench along the wharves in Galveston is something terrible, but the people are making every effort to dispose of everything that is putrifying.
“The railroad and telegraphic companies are making tremendous efforts to get into Galveston. The Postal Telegraph Company has two wires strung down the Galveston, Houston and Henderson to the junction of the Texas Terminal. Below that not a pole was left. The Western Union is making rapid progress and will lay a cable across the bay.”
George Hall, a traveling man who lives at 133 Thomas avenue, this city, returned from Galveston yesterday morning, having passed through the terrible scenes enacted there during and after the storm. To a News representative he said last night:
“I arrived at Galveston Friday afternoon, and my wife and little girl were to come down Saturday. At noon Saturday I noticed that the storm, which had been blowing all the morning, was getting worse. At that time I went to the tower of the Tremont Hotel and saw the waves rolling in toward the land. I took just one look over the city and came down. The wind increased in violence from that on and the rain fell in sheets, and I sent a telegram to my wife and advised her to stop in Houston. I think that was the last telegram that was sent from the island, as a few moments afterwards the girl told me the wires had snapped. The storm was accompanied by no thunder or lightning.
CHILDREN CRYING AND WOMEN PRAYING.
“About 4 o’clock the people who were able to get conveyances began to come in from the residence districts. The hotel did not serve any supper. From 6 to 10 o’clock was the worst of the storm, and during that time there was about 1200 people in the house. We were just as nearly like rats in a wire cage as anything could be. At 10 o’clock the water was four feet deep in the office, and it was certain death to go out doors. We were in pitch darkness all the time, although some one had secured one candle and set it up in the dining-room. Children were crying and women praying and throwing their arms around the men’s knees and asking them to save them. It was certainly as horrible a night as any one ever put on earth. I have been on the road thirty years, have been in all parts of the world, have had many hairbreadth escapes, but they did not amount to a snap of the fingers besides this.