Hundreds of firemen and rescuers were prostrated, the strain of the continued fight in the face of the awful calamity proving more than any man could stand. In the crowds at many points people fainted and in some instances dropped dead as the result of the reaction following the unprecedented shock.
At Mechanics" Pavilion scenes of heroism and later of panic were enacted. The great frame building was turned into a hospital for the care of the injured and here a corps of fifty physicians rendered aid.
Nurses volunteered their services and also girls from the Red Cross ship that steamed in from the government yards at Mare island and contributed doctors and supplies.
While the ambulances and automobiles were unloading their maimed and wounded at the building the march of the conflagration up Market street gave warning that the injured would have to be removed at once.
This work was undertaken and every available vehicle was pressed into service to get the stricken into the hospitals and private houses of the western addition. A few minutes after the last of the wounded had been carried through the door, some on cots, others in strong arms and on stretchers, shafts of fire shot from the roof and the structure burst into a whirlwind of flame.
One of the most thrilling of all stories related of adventures in stricken San Francisco during the days of horror and nights of terror is that of a party of four, two women and two men, who arrived at Los Angeles April 20, after having spent a night and the greater portion of two days on the hills about Golden Gate Park.
This party was composed of Mrs. Francis Winter, Miss Bessie Marley, Dr. Ernest W. Fleming, and Oliver Posey, all of Los Angeles.
"I was sleeping in a room on the third floor of the hotel," said Dr.
Fleming, "when the first shock occurred. An earthquake in San Francisco was no new sensation to me. I was there in 1868, when a boy ten years old, when the first great earthquake came. But that was a gentle rocking of a cradle to the one of Wednesday.
"I awoke to the groaning of timbers, the grinding, creaking sound, then came the roaring street. Plastering and wall decorations fell.
The sensation was as if the buildings were stretching and writhing like a snake. The darkness was intense. Shrieks of women, higher, shriller than that of the creaking timbers, cut the air. I tumbled from the bed and crawled, scrambling toward the door. The twisting and writhing appeared to increase. The air was oppressive. I seemed to be saying to myself, will it never, never stop? I wrenched the lock; the door of the room swung back against my shoulder. Just then the building seemed to breathe, stagger and right itself.
"But I fled from that building as from a falling wall. I could not believe that it could endure such a shock and still stand.
"The next I remember I was standing in the street laughing at the unholy appearance of half a hundred men clad in pajamas--and less.
"The women were in their night robes; they made a better appearance than the men.
"The street was a rainbow of colors in the early morning light. There was every stripe and hue of raiment never intended to be seen outside the boudoir.
"I looked at a man at my side; he was laughing at me. Then for the first time I became aware that I was in pajamas myself. I turned and fled back to my room.
"There I dressed, packed my grip, and hastened back to the street. All the big buildings on Market street toward the ferry were standing, but I marked four separate fires. The fronts of the small buildings had fallen out into the streets and at some places the debris had broken through the sidewalk into cellars.
"I noticed two women near me. They were apparently without escort. One said to the other, "What wouldn"t I give to be back in Los Angeles again."
"That awakened a kindred feeling and I proffered my a.s.sistance. I put my overcoat on the stone steps of a building and told them to sit there.
"In less than two minutes those steps appeared to pitch everything forward, to be flying at me. The groaning and writhing started afresh.
"But I was just stunned. I stood there in the street with debris falling about me. It seemed the natural thing for the tops of buildings to careen over and for fronts to fall out. I do not even recall that the women screamed.
"The street gave a convulsive shudder and the buildings somehow righted themselves again. I thought they had crashed together above my head.
"The air was filled with the roar of explosions. They were dynamiting great blocks. Sailors were training guns to rake rows of residences.
"All the while we were moving onward with the crowd. Cinders were falling about us. At times our clothing caught fire, just little embers that smoked and went out. The sting burned our faces and we used our handkerchiefs for veils.
"Everybody around us was using some kind of cloth to shield their eyes. It looked curious to see expressmen and teamsters wearing those veils.
"Quite naturally we seemed to come to Golden Gate Park. It seemed as if we had started for there. By this time the darkness was settling.
But it was a weird twilight. The glare from the burning city threw a kind of red flame and shadow about us. It seemed uncanny; the figures about us moved like ghosts.
"The wind and fog blew chill from the ocean and we walked about to keep warm. Thousands were walking about, too, but there was no disturbance.
"Families trudged along there. There was no hurry. All appeared to have time to spare. The streets, walks, and lawns were wiggling with little parties, one or two families in each. The men had brought bedding and blankets and they made impromptu shelters to keep off the fog.
"The cinders still kept falling. They seemed at times to come down right against the wind. They stung my face and made me restless.
"All night we moved about the hills. Thousands were moving with us. As the night wore on the crowd grew.
"Near daylight the soldiers came to the park. They were still moving in front of the fire.
"I had brought a little store of provisions before nightfall and somehow we had kept them. It seemed easy to keep things there. I walked over to the fire made by one squad of soldiers and picked up a tin bucket. They looked at me but made no move. I went to a faucet and turned it on. Water was there. Not much, but a trickling little stream. There was water in the park all night. I boiled some eggs and we ate our breakfast. Then we concluded to try to make our way back to the water front. We did this because the soldiers were driving us from that part of the hills. The flames were still after us.
"The dumb horror of it seemed to reach right into one"s heart. Walking and resting, we reached the ferry near sunset. We had come back through a burned district some four miles. I do not understand how the people stood it.
"Other parties staggered past us. They were reeling, but not from wine. It was here that the pangs of thirst caught us. But the end came at last. We reached the ferry and the boats were running. The soldiers were there, too. They seemed to be everywhere. They were offering milk to the women and children.
"We are in Los Angeles now. It hardly seems real. If it were not for the sting of the cinders that still stick to my face and eyes I might think it was all a nightmare."
Adolphus Busch, the St. Louis brewer, gave this account of his experiences in the earthquake:
"The earthquake which shook "Frisco made all frantic, and was undoubtedly the severest ever experienced in the United States. The St. Francis hotel swayed from south to north like a tall poplar in a storm; furniture, even pianos, was overturned, and people thrown from their beds.
"I summoned my family and friends and urged them to escape to Jefferson square, which we did.
"An awful sight met our eyes. Every building was either partly or wholly wrecked, roofs and cornices falling from skysc.r.a.pers on lower houses, crushing and burying the inmates.
"Fires started in all parts of the city, the main water pipes burst and flooded the streets, one earthquake followed another, the people became terrified, but all were wonderfully calm. Over 100,000 persons without shelter were camping on the hills. There was no light, water, nor food. Regular soldiers and the militia maintained order and discipline, otherwise more horrors would have occurred and riots might have prevailed. Then the worst happened. The fire spread over three-fourths of the city and could not be controlled, no water to fight it, no light, and the earth still trembling.
"Building after building was dismantled to check the progress of the flames, but all of no avail. We were fortunate to secure conveyances and fled to n.o.b Hill, from which we witnessed the indescribable drama.
Block after block was devastated. The fires blazed like volcanoes, and all business houses, hotels, theaters--in fact, the entire business portion--lay in ruins, and two-thirds of the residences."
CHAPTER VIII.
THRILLING PERSONAL EXPERIENCES--CONTINUED.
=Hairbreadth Escapes from the Hotels Whose Walls Crumbled--Frantic Mothers Seek Children from Whom They Were Torn by the Quake--Reckless Use of Firearms by Cadet Militia--Tales of Heroism and Suffering.=
For two weeks or more tragedy, romance and comedy crowded the lives of women and children survivors homeless in the city of ashes and in Oakland, across the bay, the city of refuge. In this latter place thousands separated from their loved ones were tearfully awaiting developments, and every hour in the day members of families were restored to each other who had been lost.
On record in the Chamber of Commerce at Oakland, which was the headquarters of the Oakland Relief Committee, some queer stories were told. Not a day pa.s.sed but there were from two to eight marriages in that office. Homeless young couples met each other, compared notes and finally agreed to marry.
At the registry bureau in Oakland scores of women, young and old, worked gratis. One applied for work to relieve her mind. She said she had seen her husband and eldest son killed and had fled with her baby.
During the rush of people she lost her baby.