Jackson County IL Archives News.....EYE WITNESS STORY OF DESTRUCTION WROUGHT BY STORM AT MURPHYSBORO March 20, 1925 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/il/ilfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Mary Riseling riseling@insightbb.com July 13, 2006, 5:56 pm St. Louis Post Dispatch March 20, 1925 A graphic eyewitness story of the destruction brought by the storm at Murphysboro, Ill., and vicinity, was related to a Post-Dispatch reporter today by Michael KILEY of 1009 Gate avenue, East St. Louis, an engineer of the Mobile & Ohio passenger train which arrived in St. Louis at 8:45 o'clock last night after being blocked for nearly three hours by the wreckage of buildings blown upon the track. "We were pulling into Murphysboro from the south at 2:35 p.m., when the tornado struck," engineer Kiley said. "Our first information that something was wrong came when the wind began to whistle through the cab and the engine was pelted with flying boards. Then we saw the terrific funnel-shaped cloud approached from the west and saw houses rumbling before it. The air was full of wreckage. As we passed the shoe factory in the south end of town, the train was so bombarded by heavy planks from the debris that I was afraid some of them would pierce the engine boiler. They struck with such force the made the engine quiver. "We kept going, sometimes plowing through the wreckage that threatened to block us, and by the time we reached the center of the town the full force of the storm was upon us. It was the most awful sight I have never witnessed. Bodies were lying in the streets and buildings everywhere were being demolished. To make matters worse for us, a big grain elevator caved in on the track and we couldn't get out of the tornado's path. We had to stay there until after 5 o'clock and several times during the wait were forced to fight hard to keep the train from catching fire from blazes that broke out in piles of debris along the tracks. "Through it all people were running about in a state of panic. We saw many being carried on stretchers or dragged from the burning remains of buildings. The fire department was helpless because the storm had broken the water mains and flames seemed to start in every dump heap. Fire swept the Blue Front Hotel after the storm and we were told that several persons lost their lives. The same thing happened at the M & O roundhouse. The destruction probably was the greatest there. I know of at least three men killed there and a lot of others were reported dead. The Logan, Longfellow and high schools were blown down and I was told a lot of children were victims, but I couldn't leave the train to find out how many were dead. "I saw several displays of heroism--injured persons helping others--but I want to mention one case in particular. That was the work of a negro cook at the Blue Front Hotel. After he had been cut and burned until he hardly looked like a human being, he worked like a demon for two hours, carrying out the dead and injured and was still working when we finally got the track cleared and left town." The approach of the tornado at Murphysboro was heralded by a loud, whistling noise, as described by William LYONS, 43 years old, a machinist employed in the M & O railroad shops there, who arrived at Union Station at noon yesterday on his way to his home in Hannibal, Mo. Lyons related that he was working with 40 others when the storm struck, blowing off the roof and crumbing brick walls. "It had been raining and a high wind blew sheets of rain against the building," he said. "Then there was heard a loud whistle and then a crash. It was all over in a minute. A brick struck me in the head and knocked me unconscious." Six of the workmen were killed and others severely injured, he said. Accounts given by other railroad men and passengers agreed with the story of Engineer KILEY. Edward WHALEN, an Illinois Central conductor, who arrived with his train about 8 a.m., reported that the entire northwest portion of Murphysboro was wiped out and was on fire until 2 a.m. today. With all electric wires down, the stricken town was in darkness through the night except when lighted by the glare of flames. Fire departments of Herrin and Carbondale rushed equipment to the scene but the Herrin truck was caught between two burning buildings and was burned itself. The others were ineffective because the water system was paralyzed. WHALEN was a member of the relief crew on a police train which was rushed to Murphysboro from Carbondale immediately after the storm. His train went back to Carbondale at 5 p.m. carrying nine dead and several refrigerator cars filled with injured. The Carbondale armory, church and schools, he said, were filled Wednesday night with victims and sufferers, the death toll mounting to about 200 at both Murphysboro and DeSoto. Only two houses, he said, remained standing in DeSoto. They and about 12 other persons were in the I.C. station waiting for a St. Louis train when the sky grew suddenly dark and the tornado swept down with devastating fury. First there were a few violet gusts of wind that rattled the windows, he related, and a few seconds later trees were being wrenched out by the roots and the air was filled with rubbish. Almost before they realized what was happening, he said, the station roof was torn from over their heads and disappeared as if by magic. His own home and all that he possessed, he said, was blown away and when he ran there from the station to investigate he found two bodies in the street in front. Although he saw the bodies of numerous dead, the only one he recognized was that of John HABERMEHL, another shopman, who is said to have a brother residing at 2814 Louisiana avenue, St. Louis. Devastation in West Frankfort was almost as great as that in Murphysboro, according to John C. McBRIDE, Illinois Central conductor, who left there with his train for St. Louis at 5:40 a.m. yesterday, arriving here about 9:30. Conditions in the town he described as "terrible." Because of the great number of injured, he said, they were being given more attention than the dead. Many bodies had been carried to the city hall, churches and Elks' Club to be given attention when the quest for injured survivors is completed. Physicians, red cross workers, and militiamen are assisting in the rescue work and guarding roads to keep out sightseers. Jacob L. WOLFF, vice president of the Golden Eagle Dry Goods Co. of Denver, who was in West Frankfort during the storm, told the Post-Dispatch reporter yesterday he saw an elderly woman picked by the wind and carried 300 feet through the air to her death. He was at a soda fountain in the south part of the town when the tornado descended. It was preceded by a heavy rain, hail and lightening. A moment later a deafening road was heard in the north end as many buildings were crushed like eggshells. He ran toward the scene, he said, to find the streets littered with dead and injured. West Frankfort, he reported, also suffered heavily from fire, the town standpipe being blown down, cutting off the water supply. When he left at 5:40 a.m. most of the injured were bring taken to Carbondale and many miners and farmers, whose homes had been wrecked, were pouring into the town in search of relief. Fires were still raging in some sections of Murphysboro at 4:30 a.m., according to H. V. PRIMROSE, a Pullman conductor on an M & O train which passed through the town at that hour. Many large buildings were being dynamited to block the flames. Doctors who boarded the train there, he said, told him that only four out of 250 children in one school escaped injury or death. The path of the storm seemed to him to be about half a mile wide. At the M & O shops, he said, it cut directly through some of the buildings, demolishing the roundhouse and leaving six known dead in its wake. M. J. MULCONNERY, city freight agent for the Illinois Central, said he passed through DeSoto at 2:15 p.m. Wednesday just before the disaster and returned at 6 to find the town virtually annihilated. Men and women, muddy, sobbing and half clothed, thronged the houseless streets seeking their dead and injured. Fire engines were on hand, but they were helpless. There was no water and fires provided the only lights. A Missouri Pacific train arrived at East St. Louis at 11:40 a.m. yesterday, bringing 12 injured persons from the tornado area around Gorham, Ill. They were taken to St. Mary's Hospital. An incomplete list of names and injuries obtained by the Post-Dispatch reporter who met the train follows: Mrs. Mary NOLAN, fractured skull; Mrs. TIERNEY, broken right foot; Lora MATTINGLY, head wounds; Clara MATTINGLY, internal injuries; Mrs. Wanda MATTINGLY, internal injures; Charles MATTINGLY, Norman MATTINGLY, Owen LUNSFORD, body lacerations; Miss Flossie COLLIER, C. M. BOARDMANS, Jesse MASTERSON and Jesse HUNT. Mrs. Joseph ROGERS of Murphysboro was taken from an L & N train at noon and removed to the East St. Louis home of relatives. She was suffering from shock and head wounds. Two men, injured in the tornado, arrived at Union Station at 11:27 a.m. on an Illinois Central train from Harrison, Ill. They were Gordon DEMPSEY, 37 years old, a brakeman of Dupo, Ill., and William O. SCHWARTZRAUBER, brakeman of 709 North Thirty second street, East St. Louis. Both were riding on an Illinois Central freight train a mile south of Harrison at 2:44 p.m. Wednesday when the tornado swept across the tracks. It overturned six freight cars and a caboose down a 12-foot embankment. SCHWARTZKRAUBER suffered a broken left wrist and internal injures and Dempsey was internally injured. They said the wind came out of a rain storm, almost without warning. Dr. Joseph G. BEYKIRCH of East St. Louis, one of a part of 16 doctors who went from there to Murphysboro Wednesday night, returned yesterday morning with a description of the conditions under which emergency treatment is being administered there. The Masonic Home and the Elks' Club of Murphysboro are being used as hospitals, although both buildings are roofless. Operations are being performed at both places, and although only the most serious cases have been brought there, both buildings were filled to capacity in a short time, Dr. BEYKRICH said. The injured have filled the halls, the basements and every available space. Dr. BEYKRICH said that every kind of injury possible has been suffered by the victims of the tornado. In the central part of town, only a block away from the temporary hospitals, a fire was raging Wednesday night. Workers dynamited structures around it in an attempt to arrest the progress of the flames. The hospitals were not in immediate danger from fire, Dr. BEYKRICH stated. Temporary kitchens were set up in various dwellings and a commissary train arrived Wednesday night with a supply of food. The residents are being fed from these places and from various railway dining cars which came with the commissary train. Additional Comments: Widely considered the most devastating and powerful tornado in American history, the Great Tri-State Tornado ripped through Missouri, Illinois, and Indiana on March 18, 1925. In its 219-mile-long wake it left four completely destroyed towns, six severely damaged ones, 15,000 destroyed homes, and 2,000 injured. Most significantly, 695 people were killed, a record for a single tornado. Transcribed by Mary Riseling from grandfather C. E. RISELING's collection of old newspapers. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/il/jackson/newspapers/eyewitne88nnw.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.net/ilfiles/ File size: 11.9 Kb