Anonymous

“ Two or three undertakers’ wagons with the ugly coffins from the dead-house, were in attendance, but the uninterrupted procession of corpses, which was so horrible a feature of the scene on Wednesday, ended late at night, and on this morning there was nothing to see save the smouldering ruins of the theatre. There was only the great void where the theatre had stood, a mere rim of crumbling walls, scarcely breast high, enclosing immense heaps of brick and rubbish, from which columns of steam arose in the air. ”

“ But one man and two women were in the auditorium, and bidding them fly for their lives, Conn seized one of the pillars supporting the family circle gallery, and by a few vigorous muscular efforts raised himself to the top of the railing. Jumping quickly over he rushed toward one of the exits, through which a maddened crowd was struggling in tumult and disorder. In vain he endeavored to quell their frenzy. Forcing his way toward the head of the stairs, his strong arm was exerted to hurl back frightened men and allow the shrieking, shouting mass below to escape. ”

“ In the evening the work was continued by the aid of calcium lights. It was thought best to discontinue the removal of the bodies from the rear through Theatre alley to Myrtle avenue. Sixty-seven in all had been taken out that way. The main entrance, with the ghastly burdens still regularly coming out of it, was thrown into bold relief. The burner and lantern had been knocked off the street lamp over the way, and a great flame of gas blazed and flared into the air, lighting up the scorched and splintered doorway and the upturned faces of the throng. ”

“ Instead of five men, ten men set at work among the ruins, while on the vestibule platform a dozen sturdy firemen manned the short ropes by which the coffins, laden with human remains, were drawn up and dragged to the sidewalk. All the bodies were bent into horrid shapes, assumed in the struggles of death by suffocation and by burning. Nine out of ten of the corpses had an arm upraised and bent to shield the face. ”

“ Men, women, and children thought and talked of little else than the Brooklyn Theatre and the burned dead beneath its ruins. On the sidewalks, in the street-cars, on the ferry-boats, there was one and the same subject of interest. In the neighborhood of the theatre itself the excitement was at its height. ”

“ Some women in their desperation divested themselves of their clothing, and a few succeeded in effecting their escape, but only a few. Each moment increased the crowd and intensified the block at the main door, and while it became more and more difficult to escape, the flames were spreading on the floor, flying from one prostrate body to another, and destroying the panic-stricken creatures by scores and hundreds, while the church resounded with piteous cries for help and still more heartrending shrieks of agony ”

“ Although the surging crowd was loath to obey, yet his commands were so earnest that he kept them back a sufficient time to pick up about twenty persons who would otherwise have been crushed and killed, and carried them, comparatively unhurt, into the adjoining station-house. After saving these people he returned to the theatre, which was now enveloped in flames. Men, women and children were thrown down and trampled upon, but the brave man rushed in among the frantic crowd, at the imminent risk of his own life, and pulled out a number of bodies, cut, bruised and bleeding. ”

“ The musicians in the orchestra were urging the people to retire quietly, and so were the actors. Fitzherbert instinctively turned his eyes toward them, and saw a mass of flame back of the actors, with bits of burning wood dropping down, and the sight seemed to craze him. He started to his feet, tore violently away from Miss Nettie, and dashed into the crowd struggling to escape. The instinct of self-preservation had overcome reason, and the struggle for life became fierce and uncontrollable. ”

“ The flames had subsided sufficiently to permit the firemen to make an investigation near the main entrance of the theatre. Chief Nevins passed over the trembling floor of the hallway toward the inner doorway. Inside the doors the flooring had fallen in, leaving a deep pit of fire and flame, from which a dense smoke and steam ascended. Here a sickening spectacle met his horrified gaze. Close up to the flaming furnace, and clinging to the splintered verge of the demolished flooring, was the body of a woman. ”

“ When the rush from the parquet was at its height a father and mother with their child had made their way as far as the lobby, when the father, who held the child in his arms, was knocked down by the crowd. The child fell with its father, and its cries could be heard above all the din. The father struggled to his feet, and as he arose with the child in his grasp, the blood flowed from several gashes in his face and crimsoned his shirt. At the sight of the blood the wife shrieked and immediately fainted, falling upon the people directly in front of her. ”

“ The undertakers’ wagons rattled up to the door of the old market by dozens, [Pg 33] and the coffins of stained and polished wood, studded with silver nails, were ranged in rows on the market floor, beside the black, gnarled things that had been human bodies. Outside a motley crowd of men, women, and boys pressed close to the doors and tried to get past the police lines in order to witness the work of putting the stiffened and distorted bodies into the narrow coffins. Wandering among the ghastly rows was the usual throng of sight-seers and mourners searching for friends. ”

“ Fifteen minutes after the fire broke out the interior of the theatre was wrapped in flames. Shortly after the roof fell in, and, at 11.45, a half an hour after the fire started, the broad east wall fell with a terrible crash. The few who had reached the first flight of stairs from the street were taken out and carried into the First Precinct Station-House. The crowd that had escaped from the theatre remained in the adjacent streets. Men without hats or coats, with clothing torn and faces bruised; women bonnetless and dishevelled, weeping convulsively—every face was a picture of woe and fright. ”

“ THE destruction of the Brooklyn Theatre, on the night of Tuesday, December the 5th, was the most terrible calamity of its kind that has occurred in this country. What was first deemed to be an ordinary fire, naturally involving serious financial loss to the owners, the lessees and the actors, was really a catastrophe of the most heartrending character, causing, as it did, the loss of upwards of three hundred lives. No theatre fire on this continent had so much horror lent to it. ”

“ Resting a moment, Conn again dashed forward and burst the door open against the struggling throng. In an instant the two were in the midst of the frenzied mob, who fought and struggled for life with the desperation of mad men. Men and women were being trampled upon by those behind them, and the former were as terror-stricken as the latter. The glare in the street, and the smoke in the corridor, enhanced the terror of those seeking an exit. ”

“ The house was packed, and when Henriette said to the blind Louise, “Don’t say so, dear sister; we are not without friends, I hope,” the audience rose as with a single impulse, and for five minutes stopped the action of the play by demonstrations as wild as they were encouraging. It soon became evident, however, that the Conway element could not make the theatre a success, and a lease was issued to Sheridan Shook and A. M. Palmer, of the New York Union Square Theatre. ”

“ The disaster at the Brooklyn Theatre far surpasses in loss of life any accident by fire in this country or Europe. Theatres have been frequently burned and losses of life have not been uncommon, but the Brooklyn tragedy is altogether unparalleled. ”

“ All the clothing was burnt off, and the features were so blackened that she was unrecognizable, and the body was removed to the Morgue.
At 4 o’clock in the morning the flames were put out, and the heap of debris was black and cold. From the vestibule platform the firemen saw a most horrible spectacle. The mound that had at first appeared to be simply a heap of ashes proved to be almost wholly composed of human bodies. Heads, arms, legs, shoulders, shoes, and here and there entire human remains protruded through the surface of the mound. ”

“ The march was a terrible one, for its oppressive gloom, the deadly cold, the grief on every hand; but that portion from Sixth avenue to the gate of Greenwood Cemetery was in all respects the worst. All that way the roll of the muffled drums continued, and across the wide vacant spaces toward the bay the icy blast seemed the breath of death itself.
Battle Hill, where the arrangements for the interment of the bodies in one common grave had already been made, is the highest point of ground in the cemetery, and is situated but a short distance from the gate by which the procession entered. ”

“ All who made inquiry for friends or relatives were necessarily disappointed, for the blackened, charred bodies were few of them in a condition to be identified. Strong men, who had kept up both heart and hope, broke down and sobbed like women when they learned their own flesh and blood might never be discovered from out of the scores of shapeless trunks that were being exhumed from the ruins. Women came in sobbing and went away convulsed with grief. ”

“ The arms of nearly all the dead were fixed as though shielding their faces, and one woman had drawn her clothing over her face and clinched her hands above her forehead. Two young men were grappled together as though they had had a personal encounter in an attempt to escape from the theatre. Others lay on their sides in the manner of persons who thus slumber. ”

“ Hecht, speaking to Coroner Nolan, “that the people were mistaken in the identification of the remains, but when over half a dozen people, whom I saw by their actions had no one among the unfortunates, came along, and with pretended cries of grief pointed out the body as that of some relative, I knew that it was done for the sake of obtaining possession of the valuables.”
Mr. Hecht, before seeking out the coroner to obtain a permit for the removal of the body, placed his son, the dead boy’s brother, guard over the remains. ”

“ The third door at the front entrance opened on a short and narrow hall, on one side of which was the party wall, and on the other a high iron partition. From this hall one [Pg 41] long flight of narrow stairs led, two stories up, to the gallery. At all times the exodus of the gallery boys, in all theatres, is noisy and turbulent, but on an occasion like this no words could picture the rush. Critical examination of the places of exit from the lower sections of the theatre affords no ground for censure of the architect, but the gallery exit couldn’t by any ingenuity be worse. ”

“ Mr. Henry S. Murdoch, one of the victims of the terrible calamity, was engaged in the cast of the “Two Orphans” as Pierre, the cripple, and was the sole support of a widowed mother and two sisters, who reside in Philadelphia. The latter were expected in Brooklyn next week to visit their brother during the Christmas holidays. Mr. Murdoch was born in Boston, August 5, 1845, and was consequently in the thirty-second year of his age. He received his education in Philadelphia, and made his début at the Arch Street Theatre, in that city, in the winter of 1864. ”

“ The daily newspapers have given their readers many instances of true bravery displayed by men and women holding prominent positions in the world, but it remains for the writer to be the chronicler of a series of more daring acts and wonderful escapes, and the historian of two people who passed through the ordeal of fire, one of whom deserves a place high in the record of “brave men who did brave deeds.” ”

“ The bodies of the actors Murdoch and Burroughs were taken to Irving Hall at 1 o’clock on Saturday, and remained in state until the funeral on Sunday.
Great festoons of crape hung in long curves from a common centre in the middle of the room reaching to the galleries, that were draped in funeral cloth. Each end of the hall bore its burden of black. Two circles of gas in the ceiling cast a melancholy radiance. The bodies were encased in two rosewood coffins mounted with silver, which were placed in the centre of the room. ”

“ Nearly every person had permits from the Coroner’s office, and the women visitors were in the majority.
A most shameful and vulgar feature of the inroad upon the Morgue was the vast number of women who, through mere curiosity, insisted upon entering the building. Women who were naturally nervous and hysterical forced their way in and risked good clothing and head dress in their wild attempts to hover over the bodies. They began to sob and gesticulate long before they reached the hallway in which twenty-three blackened corpses were in line on the marble floor. ”

“ At four o’clock, when a hundred and forty-seven bodies had been exhumed on the Washington street side, fifty-three had been carried from the alley-way in the rear. Moving among the firemen, either as spectators or supervisors of the ghastly work, were Chief Engineer Nevins, Police Commissioner Hurd, Fire Commissioner McLaughlin, Assistant Engineer Farley, and ex-Police Superintendent Folk.
Surrounding the ruins, in Washington, Johnson and Adams streets, were throngs of people who stood close together on the sidewalks and left only room enough for one vehicle at a time to traverse the roadways. ”

“ The smoke became unbearable, and the police and firemen who had been able to penetrate the crowd at all were obliged to retire. They seized as many of the paralyzed bodies as they could and dragged them into the street, passing on their way out over piles of insensible men and boys. ”

“ Every indication points to the belief that, suffocated by the smoke forced down like a wall from the roof, the mass of those in the upper gallery thronged about the entrance to the stairs and were either blocked there so as to make exit impossible, or were unable even to make the attempt to escape, and sank down, one upon the other, to fall in a mass into the horrible pit under the vestibule when the supports of the gallery were burned away. ”