Further Details of Martinique Horror
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FURTHER DETAILS OF MARTINIQUE HORROR Captain of the Steamer “Roddam” Describes the Terrible Scenes Through Which He Passed —Tale Perhaps Never Had a Parallel in Stories of the Sea passed First of all the ships that watch I found that we had been about to everybody to stand clear. An In- Lucia, the brave man refused all medi- . culminates in the vast crater of Morne through the shower of ashes of Mont an hour reaching daylight. stant later the air was filled with flame cal treatment until the others were y Garou, which in 1812 was the scene Pelee and reached the American main- "Our decks were covered two inches and falling batches of fire. The ship cared for. He will live, the doctors of a tremendous eruption. Billions of land to tell about It, the British Etona, with this matter.” and the captain ex- was immediately ablaze from end to tell me.” tonH of rock and earth were hurled bound to New York from Montevideo hibited a box of volcanic dust, which end, and the crew and laborers aboard air—part, BEAUTIFUL ISLE OF ST. VINCENT high into the aa molten and St. Lucia, has arrived at New had been saved by his crew. “You began to rush about, frantic with pain. lava, flowed down Into the sea; part, York. Her captain, John Cantell, and can see the marks of it yet about the “Capt. Freeman ran Into tin.' chart- Wm an Earth!? rara ll««- lleforr tha shivered into thin dust, was carried her passengers brought woodwork, with them a marts and our polished room, but was driven out again by Rat ant Awful IMuaa'er. high up into the clouds. For threo thrilling story, not only of their own and I don’t think my passengers, are flames that came in at the port hole. Bt. Vincent, which has suffered from days the awful convulsions of nature curiosity experience in the second eruption of yet over their fright. No Then he rushed to the engine room the eruption of Its own ttoufirlere vol- .continued. The dust from the crater Martinique's destroyer, but of the would ever take us again near that telephone and signaled the engineer to cano, is one of the most beautiful and so obscured the rays of the sun and Roddam and her heroic captain, whom terrible place. put on full steam. Some one responded picturesque islands in the British brought on a darkness so terrifying they visited In the St. Lucia hospital. "Before leaving St. Lucia,” Capt. and the ship began to move, but the West Indian group. It has an area of that the few survivors believed that The Etona reached St. Lucia on the Cantell Bald, “we visited the wreck steering gear was jammed and would 131 square miles and has heen de- the world had come to an end. The evening of May 10, expecting to coal of the Roddam, which escaped from not work. He kept the engine going scribed aa one of the flashing Jewels impalpable dust was carried by the trade winds to the Islands of Barba- dos and Bt. Lucia aud turned day Into PART THE WEST INDIES SHOWING SCENES night. The Inhabitants became panic- BIRD’S-EYE VIEW OF OF OF VOLCANIC DISTURBANCE stricken with fear and abandoned their ordinary vocations and devoted themselves to prayer and fasting. This was the dosing period of a series of volcanic eruptions which had lasted two yenrs, and the direc- tion of the seismic wavo was not un- like 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 10,000 persons per- ished. With the exception of the great Lisbon earthquake, the eruption of the mighty mountain was '.he most frightful cataclysm known to tho world up to that time. Tho whole configuration of the Island wan changed. The eastern end sank Into the sea. and where It stood there Is now a great depth of water. The vol- canic forces remained quiescent until and leave the same night. In the St. Pierre May 8. The watchman was ahead and astern alternately, hoping that lie like a necklace around the 1882, and then tho wnrulng rumble harbor news was received of the St. engaged in gathering up fragments of to free the paddles, and in so doing Caribbean sea. The last British cen- was heard again; hut it was a false Pierre disaster, and, lying at anchor, human bodies and putting them away nearly struck the Quebec Lim- steamer sus credited it with a population of alarm, and the terrible scenes of the was all that was left of the Roddam. in the locker. He discontinued the Roralma, from which clouds of steam 50,000, of whom a largo majority are enrly part of the eontury were not re- All St. Lucia was in mourning and work to show us around. and flame were rising. negroes engaged In the cultivation of peated. the people wero so distracted by the “The Roddam presented an awful “Men on the Roralma were wring- sugar cane, which Is the principal The island of Bt. Vincent lies 100 news from the neighboring island that spectacle. She looked as if she had ing their hands and rushing about crop. Two hundred years ago It was miles west of Barbados and between it was not until May 11 that Capt. been thrust Into soft, clinging mud frantically. Some of them Jumped In- the home of the Carib Indians, who St. Lucia and the Grenadines. From Cantell could obtain coal and pass on and pulled out again. The mud stuck to the sea. where they must have died were induced by the French to Join north to south stretchei a ridge of his journey. St. Pierre was passed to her like cement and was two feet Instantly, Capt. Freeman said, for the In a revolution against England. They high, wooded hills, extending to tho at a distance of about four miles and deep on her decks. Awnings, stan- all on board studied the land with chions and boat covers had been glasses. burned or swept away. Tarpaulins, rails, stays, hatch covers even < “The weather was clear and we had and her smokestacks were gone. When a fine view,” said the captain, "but the old lines of St. Pierre were the watchman dug into the lava ho not found here of recognizable. Everything was a mass and there fragments human remains. left of of blue lava, and the formation of All that waß the ship was her hull, and that, being the land itself seemed to have iron, had escaped destruction. changed. When we were about eight “Hearing that Capt. Freeman was miles off the northern end of the is- at the Hotel Felite, we called on him. land Mont Pelee began to belch a f I wanted to get from his own lips Iho second time. Clouds of smoke and story of bis escape. 1 was unprepared lava shot into the air and spread over for the terrible sight which greeted . all the sea. darkening the sun. Our my eyes when I entered the room. decks in a few minutes were cov- "Capt. Freeman's face was burned ered. with a substance that looked like to the color of teak wood and large sand dyed brown, which smelled like patches phosphorous. of skin and flesh were burned from his bones, here and there. Both “Partial darkness came upon us, his hands were swathed In bandages. and everybody on board the ship was His hair and mustache were gone, his badly frightened. After the Btories eyes were tied open and he was in heard we had and the sights we had great pain. When I told him who 1 at seen St. Lucia we did not know •was he talked a great deal, to relieve but that we ourselves were to be bur- himself, he Bald, of his suffering. led under red-hot lava or engulfed by “He said the Roddam had been in wave, another tidal though we wero St. Pierre only an hour when the erup- then ten miles from shore. tion occurred. He was talking to an “ ‘Crowd on steam,’ 1 whistled to agent in a boat alongside when a big Chief Engineer Farrish, and be need- black squall approached the Bhlp ed no urging. Slowly we drew away from the islund. It was like a black through a suffocating atmosphere, wall, traveled fast and was accom- foot by foot, yard by yard, and at last panied by a tidal wave and a deafen- the sun began shining. We had ing roar. The sun disappeared im- • (raarcAFmrrosBAm wm nxrnvm) passed outside the hailstorm of dust mediately. "KEAKATQA"INACTION and sand. When t looked at my "Capt. Freeman said that he shouted water was boiling Boufrlere, ISLAND like a caldron. It were crushed and thousands were sea on either side. The OF ST. VINCENT. was like a mass of boiling mud. Many transported. Hundreds, rather than which Is now In eruption. Is In the of the Roddam's crew had disappeared, submit, threw themselves into the northwest. It towers 3,000 feet above probably swept overboard, and the rest sea. A few descendants of these orig- the sea. Its crater is three miles in went one by one until only six were inal owners of the Island still exist circumference and 500 feet deep. left. Every one of them must have on lands granted to them by the Brit From the summit the view on all sides died a terrible death.