OCR Text |
Show '-- V i URTHER DETAILS OF MARTINIQUE HORROR Captain d the Steamer Roddam Describes the Terrible Scenes Through Which He Passed Tale Perhaps Never Had a Parallel in Stories of the Sea First of all the ships that passed watch I found that we had been about through the shower of ashes of Mont an hour reaching daylight. Our decks were covered two inches Pelee and reached the American mainwith the British to this matter, and the captain exabout tell ELona, land it, bound to New York from Montevideo hibited a box of volcanic dust, which You and St. Lucia, has arrived at New had been saved by hlB crew. York. Her captain, John Cantell, and can see the marks of it yet about the her passengers brought with them a nmsts and our polished woodwork, thrilling story, rot only of their own and I don't think my passengers are experience in the second eruption of yet over their fright. No curiosity Martinique's destroyer, but of the would ever take us again near that lloddam and her heroic captain, whom terrible place. "Before leaving St. ('apt. they visited in the St. Lucia hospital. The Etoua reached St. Lucia on fho Cantell said, we visited the wreck evening of May It), expecting to coal oi the lloddam, which escaped from Lm-ia- , X-- ( WVC'SJCb.K the brave man refused all medl-staeal treatment until the others were cared for. He will live, the doctors tell me." Lm-ia- . j J j I j nt EEAUT1FUL ,SLE 'rth-- Kni : j j VINCENT OF ST. nror irssi th ituacar. Awful St. Vincent, which has suffered from the eruption of its own souflriere auo. is one of the must beautiful and iu the British islands West Indian group, it lias an area of square miles and has been described as one of the flashing jewels 131 1 us?. K Cessna - VIEW. OF PART OF THE BIRDS-EY- E to everybody to stand clear. An lu- later the air was filled with ilame and falling batches of fire. The ship was immediately ablaxe from end :o end. and the crew and laborers abom began to rush about, frantic with pain. Capt. Freeman ran into the chart- room, but was driven out again by flames that came in at the port liol Then he rushed to the engine room and signaled the engineer to put on full steam. Some one respondtM and the ship began to move, but th.1 steering gear was jammed and would not work. He kept the engines going -- WXJOrSTTTTSSJ'TrBUHl- TJ MU fUl e auawos AJWflSUv o kJIk .aJf utsaiAttou tounriy iftdtry tashsa aMA Danish GtwsnltttfYiiM it J mu aST.Pitot. emu sot V ctr . Vr.TH0uJSf4jrj . pact !cm Wi t T'r; ,jt and leave the same night In the harbor news was received of the St. Pierre disaster, and, lying at anchor, was all that was left of the Roddam. All SL Lucia was in mourning and the people were so distracted by the news from the neighboring island that It was not until May 11 that Capt. Cantell could obtain coal and pass on his journey. St. Pierre was passed at a distance of about four miles and all on board studied the land with glasses. The weather was clear and we had a fine view," paid the captain, "but the old lines of St. Pierre were not recognisable. Everything was a mass of blue lava, and the formation of the land Itself seemed to have changed. When we were about eight Smiles off the northern end of tlm Island Mont Pelee began to belch a second time. Clouds of smoke and lava shot Into the air and spread over all the sea. darkening the sun. Our decks in a few minutes were covered with a substance that looked like Band dyed brown, which smelled like phosphorous. "Partial darkness came upon us. and everybody on board the ship was After the stories badly frightened. we had heard and the sights we bad seen at St. Lucia we did not know but that we ourselves were to bo burt lava or engulfed by ied under another tidal ware, though we were then ten miles from shore. Crowd on steam, 1 whlstleu to Chief Engineer Farrish, aud lie needed no urging. Slowly we drew an ay through a suffocating atmosphere, foot by foot, yard by yard, and at last the sun began Rhinlug. We had passed odtside the hailstorm of dust and sand. When i looked at my red-ho- ISLAND St. Pierre May 8. The watcaman was engaged in gathering up fragments of human bodies and putting them away in the locker. He discontinued the work to show us around. The Roddam presented an awful spectat le. She looked as If she had been thrust into soft, clinging mud and pulled out again. The mud stuck to her like cement and was two feet deep on her decks. Awnings, stanchions and boat covers had been burned or swept away. Tarpauli..s, even i ails, stays, hatch covers and her smokestacks wore gone. When the watchman dug into the lava be found here and there fragments of human remains. All that was left of the ship was her hull, and that, being iron, had escaped destruction. Hearing that Capt. Freeman was at the Hotel Felite, we called on him. wanted to get from his own lips '.he story of his escape. 1 was unprepared for the terrible Bight which greeted my eyes when I entered the room. Capt. Freeman's face was burned to the color of teak wood and large patches of skin and flesh were burned from his bones, here and there. Both his hands were swathed in bandages. His hair and mustache were gone, his eyes were tied open and he was in great pain. When 1 told him who I was he talked a great deal, to relieve himself, he Bald, of his suffering. He paid the Roddam had been in St. Pierre only an hour when the eruption Occurred. He was talking to an agent in a boat alongside when a big the black squall approached ship from the island. It was like a black wall, traveled fast and was accompanied by a tidal wave and a deafening roar. The sun disappeared immediately. Capt. Freeman said that he shouted ahead and astern alternately, hoping to free the paddles, and in so doing nearly struck the Quebec Line steamer Horaima, from which clouds of steam and flame were rising. Men on the Roraiaia were wringabout ing their hands and rushing frantically. Some of them jumped into the sea, where they must have died instantly, Capt Freeman Baid, for the x v nrvTTvnnnra that lie like a necklace around of a tremendous eruption. Billions of tons of rock and earth were hurled high into the air part, as molten lava, flowed down Into the sea; part, shivered into thin duHt, was carried high up Into the clouds. For three days the awful convulsions of nature continued. The dust from the crater so obscured the rays of the sun and brought on a darkness so terrifying that the few BurvivorB believed that the world had come to an end. The impalpable dust was carried by the trade winds to the islands of Barbados and St. Lucia and turned day into n night. The inhabitants became with fear and abandonnd their ordinary vocations and devoted themselves to prayer and fasting. This was the closing period of a series of volcanic eruptions which had lasted two years, and the direction of the seismic wave was not unlike that which devastated Martinique. The disturbance in 1812 seemed to pass under the bed of the ocean to Venezuela, Caracas, the capital of that country, was partly destroyed by an earthquake and 10,U(i0 persons perished. With the exception of the great Lisbon earthquake, the eruption of the mighty mountain was the most to the frightful cataclysm known world up to that time. The whole was of the island configuration changed. The eastern end sank into the sea, and where it stood there is now a great depth of water. The volcanic forces remained quiesrent until 1882, and then the warning rumble was heard again; out it was a false alarm, and the terrible scenes of the early part of the century were not repeated. The island of St. Vincent lies 100 miles west of Barbados and between St. Lucia and the Grenadines. From north to south stretches a ridge of high, wooded hills, extending to the panic-stricke- INDIES SHOWING SCENES OF VOLCANIC DISTURBANCE VEST culminates in the vast crater of Morn y Garou, which in 1812 was the scene, the Caribbean si a. The last British census credited it with a population of 5o, no, of whom a large majority are negroes engaged in Hie cultivation of sugar cane, which is the principal crop. Two hundred years ago it was the homo of the Carili Indians, who were induced by the French to Join in a revolution against England. They 1 OF GT. VINCENT. "GEORGETOWN water was boiling like a caldron. It was like a mass of boiling mud. Many of the Roddam's crew had disappeared, probably swept overboard, and the rest went one by one until only six were left. Every one of them must have died a terrible death. After a time the captain got the steering gear working, the ship answered her helm and he headed her out to sea. Slowly the sky cleared, and it was possible for him to see about him. Men In the red hot lava lay dying all along Ills track. He himself, though he stayed at the wheel, was unable to lift hiB burned arms. Blood from his forehead kept running into ills eyes, obscuring his vision. He likened liis escape to the passage from hell Into heaven. At last he reached the open sea, and with the help of two sailors, two engineers and the boatswain, succeeded in taking his boat to St. Lucia. During the run out of the harbor died a horrible the chief englm-edeath. He escaped the first shock, started the engines and, not finding his men below, went on deck to look for them. As he thrust his head out of the hatch a mass of lava fell upon him, burning one side of his face completely off. Capt. Freeman's performance perhaps never had a parallel in stories of the sea." continued (apt. Cantell When the i.oddntn arrived at St. and thousands were sea on cither side. The Soutnei . Hundreds, rather than which is now in eruption, is in the into the northwest. It towers 3,000 feet above submit, threw themselves sea. A few descendants of these orig- the sea. Its crater Is three miles ia inal owners of the island still exist circumference and 500 feet deep. on lauds rranted to them by the Brit- From the summit the view on all sides was superb. ish government. St. Vincent, like all the islands in Borrowers must not be choosers. the group, is of volcanic origin and were crushed transported. r UKF IN I KA1KK THAT IIAS IHSATl'KAlIKlt. wr n |