History of the Johnstown Flood: Including all the Fearful Record; the Breaking of the South Fork Dam; the Sweeping Out of the Conemaugh Valley; the Over-Throw of Johnstown; the Massing of the Wreck at the Railroad Bridge; Escapes, Rescues, Searches for Survivors and the Dead; Relief Organizations, Stupendous Charities, etc., etc., With Full Accounts also of the Destruction on the Susquehanna and Juniata Rivers, and the Bald Eagle Creek.Johnson, Willis Fletcher
History
History of the Johnstown Flood: Including all the Fearful Record; the Breaking of the South Fork Dam; the Sweeping Out of the Conemaugh Valley; the Over-Throw of Johnstown; the Massing of the Wreck at the Railroad Bridge; Escapes, Rescues, Searches for Survivors and the Dead; Relief Organizations, Stupendous Charities, etc., etc., With Full Accounts also of the Destruction on the Susquehanna and Juniata Rivers, and the Bald Eagle Creek.
Friday night was one of terror to the people of that section. The
Monocacy river rose rapidly from the time the rain ceased until last
night, when the waters began to fall. The back-water of the river
extended to the eastern limit of the city, flooding everything in its
path and riding over the fields with a fierce current that meant
destruction to crops, fences and everything in its path. At the
Pennsylvania Railroad bridge the river rose thirty feet above low-water
mark. It submerged the floor of the bridge and at one time threatened it
with destruction, but the breaking away of 300 feet of embankment on the
north side of the bridge saved the structure. With the 300 feet of
embankment went 300 feet of track. The heavy steel rails were twisted by
the waters as if they had been wrenched in the jaws of a mammoth vise.
The river at this point and for many miles along its course overflowed
its banks to the width of a thousand feet, submerging the corn and wheat
fields on either side and carrying everything before it. Just below the
railroad bridge a large wooden turnpike bridge was snapped in two and
carried down the tide. In this way a half-dozen turnpike bridges at
various points along the river were carried away. The loss to the
counties through the destruction of these bridges will foot up many
thousand dollars.
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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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