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Show SEARCH FOR VICTIMS f'PlB OF DISASTER CONTINUES j fl H NEW YORK. June 16. When the , j dread tale of the General j. Slocum Is fully told when the f' U Hj last blockoncd body has been , j taken from the burned hulk and , j the swift waters of Hell Gate give up i : their dead, tho catastrophe will take its ;' I place as the most appalling that has i ever occurred In the inland waters of ' America. Definite figures on the loss of i ;J ; life cannot yet be given. That more - 1 hM than 600 persons perished Is a horrible certainty, but how much In excess of , j, , .1 that number the total wlU run will, only , k mm ' ?j?f , lie known when llic "missing" column is Aw finished. According to the best obtain-, 1111 able Information about 4C0 persons are W reported us mlsping. Tho Coroner'fi- full i omoe, tho Chief i the Fire Depnrtmont Tfm and the police agree In the estimate that flW the totnl loos of Hfo will closely ap-proximate ap-proximate 1000. S'J 1 Work of Rescue, j. All during the night and through tho ijj early dawn of today, the sail work of r. i -exploring the Slocum's hull went on and ,'1 1 from dock to morgue the procession of 1 ambulance, each with Its pitiful load, I : wound lis way from the river front to lj i ' ' tho morgue at the foot of Twenty-sixth J! j otrcet, until this evening 522 bodies lay vj ' On the slabs. 1 I Most of these came from the wreck, a , hut. the night long patrol of the waters l I of East river added Its ghastly quota, 'j ? . Many Bodies in Wrack. ; iy i There are many bodies still In the hold of the- burned vessel, according to the 'ijl divers and wreckers and the river is ,'Jll! looked to to complete the list. How '(L many preferred drowning to the agony til nf rln'ntli hi- fliv Diiri xi-fnf n fr thf mil I never to rise again, during the mad race I, ' o( the vessel for the beach,, may. never 1 i t be known, for the treacherous waters of k M Hell Gate do not willingly give up their LM victim?. i C Unlike the Iroquois theater and other H'i , great catastrophes of recent years, I t-,1 where the wot' of the disaster had ex- , V tended throughout the land, the blow of f the Slocum'ii mortality falls principally ( upon one little neighborhood of a great . ) , Houses in Mourning. ; j St.' Mark's parish, which furnished nearly every victim. Has within ten I crowded blocks of the middle of the East Side, and there Is? today hardly a Hj i house that Is not one of mourning. The membership of the little Lutheran Hl church Is prncticully German or of Ger-man Ger-man descept, and all of the comparn- j lively well-to-do class'. ) The race of the burning steamer from the moment the fire was discovered until her bows crashed on the shelving beach i of North Brother Island lasted little u . more than ten minutes, yet that time sufficed for deeds of heroism which Hj make the one bright chapter In the ,i heart-rending story. Brave men, devot- jij cd mothers and even maidens and J youths of lenc-r age each contributed Hl their part to the roll of heroic acts. Exalted Self -Sacrifice. fl Jki Thei"e were rescues in the face of al- l, most certain gi atn, and useless but ex- ' alted self-sacrifice. !' " The credit for the greatest saving of i ( life is due to the hardy tugboat men and i other followers of the river, who braved ; the flames and held the- noses of their I j boats against the lire-warped steamer j'l until driven off by the awful heat, ' i-eorched and choking Dead bodies of ij women with their burned arms clasping I ( close the pitiful forms of little children ir and babies were .found, their tiny arms I I enfolding each other in a tight embrace. The dark fldo hinted at along the water .i1, front which seems to be the Inevitable H': I accompaniment of all great calamities, j Brutish Selfishness. I There has beer, no evidence of a char- j actcr specific enougli to fasten It upon ji' Individuals and permit of punishment, 1) ' but survivors and eye witnesses say that , some brutal acts of selfishness and cow- . i Ardice on the part of the Slocum's crew I' were seen, and that distress signals from i1 the burning boot were disregarded 'by 11 passing craft. One man avers that a 1 V, big white yacht passed the Slocum when the bodies of women and children were j going overboard, and did not even slack- en speed. According to this man the j LM yacht flew the pennant of the New Tork 1 Yacht club, but not the owner's pen- ' nant, which always signifies that he Is H4 I aboard, and after passing the Slocum HpV ' Ene steerc-d over to the western shore ' nnd hove to, while on her bridge a mnn Hi i in uniform vlth binoculars to his eyes, Hl watched the vessel burn. j Hospitals Filled With Wounded, i ,1 During the day yesterday 203 persons J 1 were taken to hospitals, After treat- I m inent it was found, in many cases, that (' the injuries were not serious enough to 1 .1 iirevent their going home and they were jU allowed to deparL Some of those who r it' remain in hospitals, however, are still In H' ) a critical condition. 1 All night long crowds of people visited the morgue with entreaties for a chance I to try and make identifications. Estimates of Dead. j i The estimates of the number of dead I' , i given by ofTlclals vary exceedingly. Dr. I J Darlington, the president of the Board I'j of Health, who remained at North .1' i Brother island for a great portion of the .j night, gave as his estimate a total of J' i200' Nvlh possibilities of 1250. Inspector 1 k ' Brooks, who had been at the scene since 1 I I a few minutes after the accident, placed 1 i the number of dead at nearly 1000. 1 r A particularly sad incident during the I), night was the attempt at suicide of a ) - grief-stricken mother at the morgue, i j ' This woman. Mrs. L-na Rekanskl. I went there to try to find her little I ' daughter, Wanda, who was missing, and ! found a body which she identified as i ' that of her child. Wandering from the i I ' morgue she walked down the stiing- piece of the pier and attempted to throw herself Into the river. She had been watched, however, and policemen seized her In time to save her life. She waB taken to Bcllevuc hospital. Search for Bodies. All through tho night and today men In dhing suits and others with grappling hooks In thefr hands stood on the decks of tugs which h6vered about the sunken wreck of the General Slooum. Now and then n man- in one of the weird-looking suits, would silo over the side of a lug and sink to the bottom Then another diver would appear on the surface. Probably ho had come to the surface for rest and air, or perhaps he held the body of a woman or the body of a child -in hit) rubber-coated Arms. Tho chances were that ho had come up with the dead. Beyond Recognition. I As a diver was bringing a body 0 the surface a grappling hook was placed un-ider un-ider it and it was raised to the deck of a tug. Some of these bodleB were beyond be-yond recognition. When Several bodies were recovered another tug from which divers were not worklncr. would mill alongside and transfer the dead. How many dead lie In that charred and sunken hull cannot ever be estimated esti-mated until every nook and corner of the shell has been gone over by the divers. Pathetic Incident. At sunrise toduy two divers came to the- toirfncc. In the arms of one wore two little girls clasped In each others arms. Their hair was tho same color and their dresses were alike, showing that they wore sisters. The other diver had in his arms the body of a young woman wo-man whk'h had been found with those of the Uttlo girls. In her dead hand was still clasped the dress of one of the children and the divers thought that she was their mother and had gone to death with them. The body 01 the steward when found had been rifled of several hundred dollars. dol-lars. Pastor's Family Lost. Pastor Haas of St Mark's Lutheran church, on the excursion of the Sunday-pchool Sunday-pchool of which the disaster of the General Gen-eral Slocum occurred, Is completely prostrated. . He hns been unconscious most of the time since the disaster and under the constant care of a physician. His condition Is critical. His son did not go on the- excursion. ex-cursion. He lost besides his wife and daughter, his mother-in-law, Mrs. Carl Hanson, and his slster-ln-law, Mrs William Tetimore. Mrs. Tetlmore's daughter Edith, 2 years of fige, is also lost. Rotten Life Preservers. Assistant District Attorney Garvan has placed under seal a dozen life preservers pre-servers taken from the General Slocum. Of these only three were intact. The rest had burst compartments from which the cork was pouring. The ennvny coverings of the cork were so rotten that an assistant of Mr. Garvan, who made the experiment, had no difficulty diffi-culty In ripping them open with his finger nail. Photographing Bodies. Acting under orders from Police Commissioner Com-missioner McAdoo, photographers have been nt work photographing the bodies of dead as a means of identification. The bodies are placed in coffins and are stood in an upright position In groups of four and flashlight pictures are then taken. The work of photographing began be-gan at North Brother Island, and was later taken up at the morgue. Heartrending Scenes. From midnight until long after sunrise sun-rise today the work of arranging the hundreds of unidentified bodies which were being brought down from North Brother island progressed uninterruptedly. uninter-ruptedly. The- scenes about tho morgue and at the docks where the relief boats came In laden with their ghastly freight were heartrending. Men and women who had waited for hours swaying between be-tween fear and hope gave way to bitter grief when at last the bodies of their loved ones were found among the piles of burned and mangled dea.d. Lying side by side were two women who died clasping O-eir Infant babies In their arms. ! Sole Survivor- in Family. ', A pathetic flgumamong the searchers and watchers was' sixteen-year-old Fred Hartung, the sole survivor of a family of six who went ,6ri the ill-fated excur-'Sj'on, excur-'Sj'on, His mother and four sisters have not been heard from since the Slocum went down. Thfc boy saved himself by jumping to a tug. Pall Over Public School. A heavy pall hung today over the public pub-lic school In Fifth street, near First avenue, which hf in the center of the residence district most affected by the Slocum disaster. Of the 2000 pupils of the school a large portion were relatives of the excursionists, and nearly 300 of the regular attendants did not appear In their classes todny Of this number 110 had received, permission on Tuesday to bo absent yesterday to go on the excursion. ex-cursion. Just how many lost their lives or were injured lias not yet been learned. Many Vacant Seats. Scores of boys and girls, their eyes red with weeping, today asked to be excused ex-cused because a- bi other or sister or other relatives had been lost. In everv room there were vacant seats. Study was almost out of the question. The school flag hung at half mast and there waB a total cessation of the games that precede the open sejlon. " Rigid. Investigation. A rigid Investigation of the disaster has been ordered by Secretary Cortel-you, Cortel-you, of the Department of Commerce nnd Labor. The Investigation will be conducted by the steamboat Inspection Inspec-tion service under the direction of George Uhler and Thomas H. Barrett, constituting the local board of. steamboat steam-boat inspectors In New York. |