Mrs. Charles McFadden and Miss Maggie Moore, of Taneytown, were drowned in their carriage while attempting to cross a swollen stream. The horse and vehicle were swept down the stream, and when found were lodged against a tree. Miss Moore was lying half-way out of the carriage, as though she had died in trying to extricate herself. Mrs. McFadden’s body was found near the carriage. At Knoxville considerable damage was done, and at Point of Rocks people were compelled to seek the roofs of their houses and other places of safety. A family living on an island in the middle of the river, opposite the Point, fired off a gun as a signal of distress. They were with difficulty rescued. In Frederick county, Md., the losses aggregate $300,000.
The heaviest damage in Maryland was in the vicinity of Williamsport, Washington county. The railroads at Hagerstown and Williamsport were washed out. The greatest loser is the Cumberland Valley Railroad. Its new iron bridge across the Potomac river went down, nothing being left of the structure except the span across the canal. The original cost of the bridge was $70,000. All along the Potomac the destruction was great. At and near Williamsport, where the Conococheague empties into the Potomac, the loss was very heavy.
At Falling Waters, where only a few days before a cyclone caused death and destruction, two houses went down in the angry water, and the little town was almost entirely submerged. In Carroll County, Md., the losses reached several hundred thousand dollars. George Derrick was drowned at Trevanion Mills, on Pipe creek. Along the Patapsco river in Howard county great damage was done to mills and private property. Near Sykesville the water undermined the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad track and a freight train was turned over an embankment. William Hudson was standing on the Suspension Bridge, at Orange Grove, when the structure was swept away, and he was never seen again.
Port Deposit, near the mouth of the Susquehanna river, went under water. Residents along the river front left their homes and took refuge on the hills back of the town. The river was filled with thousands of logs from the broken booms up in the timber regions. From the eastern and southern sections of the State came reports of entire fruit farms swept away. Two men were drowned in the storm by the capsizing of a sloop near Salisbury.
A number of houses on the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers near Harper’s Ferry were destroyed by the raging waters which came thundering down from the mountains, thirty to forty feet higher than low-water mark. John Brown’s fort was nearly swept away. The old building has withstood a number of floods. There is only a rickety portion of it standing, anyhow, and that is now covered with mud and rubbish. While the crowds on the heights near Harper’s Ferry were watching the terrible work of destruction, a house was seen coming down the Potomac. Upon its roof were three men wildly shouting to the people on the hills to save them. Just as the structure struck the railroad bridge, the men tried to catch hold of the flooring and iron work, but the swift torrent swept them all under, and they were seen no more. What appeared to be a babe in a cradle came floating down behind them, and a few moments later the body of a woman, supposed to be the mother of the child, swept by. Robert Connell, a farmer living upon a large island in the Potomac, known as Herter Island, lost all his wheat crop and his cattle. His family was rescued by Clarence Stedman and E. A. Keyser, an artist from Washington, at the risk of their lives. The fine railroad bridge across the Shenandoah, near Harper’s Ferry, was destroyed. The Ferry Mill Company sustained heavy losses.
Along the South Mountains, in Washington and Alleghany counties, Md., the destruction was terrible. Whole farms, including the houses and barns, were swept away and hundreds of live stock killed. Between Williamsport, Md., and Dam No. 6 on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal twenty-six houses were destroyed, and it is reported that several persons were drowned. The homeless families are camping out on the hills, being supplied with food and clothing by the citizens of Williamsport.
Joseph Shifter and family made a narrow escape. They were driven to the roof of their house by the rising waters, and just a minute before the structure collapsed the father caught a rowboat passing by, and saved his wife and little ones.
The town of Point of Rocks, on the Potomac river, twelve miles eastward of Harper’s Ferry, was half-submerged. Nearly $100,000 worth of property in the town and vicinity was swept away. The Catholic Church there is 500 feet from the river. The extent of the flood here may be imagined when it is stated that the water was up to the eaves of the church.
The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal has been utterly lost, and what formerly was the bed of the canal is now part of the Potomac river. There were but few houses in Point of Rocks that were not under water. The Methodist Church had water in its second story. The two hotels of which the place boasts, the American and the St. Charles, were full of water, and any stranger in town had to hunt for something to eat.
Every bridge in Frederick county, Md., was washed away. Some of these bridges were built as long ago as 1834, and were burned by the Confederate and Union forces at various times in 1864, afterward being rebuilt. At Martinsburg, W. Va., a number of houses were destroyed. Little Georgetown, a village on the Upper Potomac, near Williamsport, Md., was entirely swept away.