The Complete Story
OF THE
Galveston Horror.
Written by the Survivors.
Incidents of the awful Tornado, Flood and Cyclone Disaster; PersonalExperiences of Survivors; Horrible Looting of Dead Bodies andthe Robbing of Empty Homes; Pestilence from so many DecayingBodies Unburied; Barge Captains Compelled by Armed Men toTow Dead Bodies to Sea; Millions of Dollars raised to aid theSuffering Survivors; President McKinley Orders Army Rations andArmy Tents issued to Survivors and orders U. S. Troops to protectthe People and Property; Tales of the Survivors from Galveston;Adrift all Night on Rafts; Acts of Valor; United StatesSoldiers Drowned; Great Heroism; Great Vandalism; Great Horror;A Second Johnstown Flood, but worse: Hundreds of Men,Women and Children Drowned; No way of Escape, only
Death! Death! Everywhere!
Edited by
John Coulter,
Formerly of the N. Y. Herald.
Fully Illustrated with Photographs.
UNITED PUBLISHERS OF AMERICA.
Copyright, 1900, by E. E. Sprague.
PREFACE.
In presenting to the people of this country and the world a chronicle ofthe frightful visitation of hurricane and flood upon the beautiful andenterprising City of Galveston, which unparalleled calamity occurred onSeptember 8, 1900, the Publishers wish to say that the utmost care hasbeen taken to make the record of the catastrophe complete in everyparticular.
No expense has been spared to obtain the facts; the illustrationscontained in the work are from photographs taken by artists on the spot;the experiences of survivors were obtained from the victims themselves,their language being faithfully reported, while what they wrote isreproduced without a single change being made.
The situation in the stricken City of Galveston is portrayed day by dayexactly as it existed, and is not the product of imaginings of writers whoput down what the conditions should have been; the storm has been followedfrom its inception, just south of the island of San Domingo, to Galveston,through Texas and then along its course until it disappeared in the broadAtlantic off the Eastern coast; the horrors of the gale, the cruel killingof thousands by the winds and waters, the wrecking of thousands ofbuildings and the drowning of helpless men, women and children, are allgiven in graphic and picturesque language.
The fearful mutilation of the dead by the ghouls and vandals who afterwarddespoiled the corpses of their valuables and the swift vengeance whichfollowed these unutterable crimes when the troops shot the vampires andharpies by the score, are told in the most vivid way; the disposal of thedead by casting their bodies into the sea, burying them hastily in thesands along the beach or cremating them by burning upon vast funeral pyreserected in the principal streets of the city are painted in the ghastlycolors of truth; the wave of insanity which swept over the city andclaimed hundreds who had escaped the perils of the