Terrible Explosion in Chicago.

Feilding Star, Volume XVI, Issue 63, 8 September 1894, Page 4

Terrible Explosion in Chicago.

o \ On the afternoon of July IG, on one J of the busiest and prattiest thorough- 0 fares of Chicago, a tremendous sensa- t' tion was caused by the explosion of an artillery caisson belonging** to Light $ Battery F of the Second Artillery, which, escorted by a cavalry detachment, had just reached Fortieth street. What caused the explosion army men cannot tell. The caisson carried j , sixty-eight rounds ol shrapnell, an ,■* equal number of steel shells, and 130 \ cartridges — over 5001bs of cannon powder. The battery had come from Fort Hiley in Kansas, and the caisson, which exploded, had been jumped and humped over rough western roads at a gallop, but the ammunition it con- - tamed had been nrnutely examined c . the day before. Yet, going at a gen- ■] tie trot over a smooth boulevard, a ] ; shell somewhere in one of the am- ( munition chests exploded, the detona- ' tion set off all the cartridges and all 1 the rest shrapnell shells — a storm of l 1 powder, leaden balls, and jagged scraps of irou sufficient to stop the . charge of a brigade of cavalry. There ■ was first the booming, deafening j ' crash of the powder. It smashed 1 every pane of glass in the neighbourhood, jarred the whole southern side < ' ofthe city, tore the caisson itselt into i hits of twisted iron and splinters of oak, and crushed tho life out of thi four horses attached to it, and des- j troying* the gun lollowing. Two bom - 1 bardiers were sitting* on the animuni- • tion chest that first exploded ; their ■ ', fragments were found, one on the ■ riffht, the other on the left, 150 yards ■ 1 away, and they did not look as if they > had ever been men. Then, before ' the lumbering thunder of the burning ' Eowder had died away, the shrapnell egan to crack. The smoky air was absolutely full of bullets and scraps of shell. A cavalryman just in the rear of the caisson had his head blown - off. The horses on both sides of the ' f street were riddled and spattered In' the rain of projectiles, and the very grass on the pathways was ripped ' and torn. Over sixtj f rounds of shrapnell exploded inside of a minute, every one of the shells containing* 150-oz balls of lead and 150 scraps of jagged iron. What saved the rest of " the men was the horses. '1 he force of the explosion spent itselt on the poor beasts that drew the caisson nnd j those attached to the gun just in the rear. The casualties wer^ : — Four men killed outright, three fatally hurt, and twelve more cr less severely injured. Several remarkable escapes J are recorded, but the narrowest was t that of Lieutenant Tompkins, ot the Seventh Regiment. He was riding [ just ahead of Farrier Gay lor and Bugler Antes The shell which . killed Gaylor split almost in Tomp- ' kins's face. Half of it fl.-w over one of his shoulders, decapitating Gay- , ler ; the other half went by the officer ' and struck Antes, who was on the I other side of him. The bugler was . struck in the arm, wliich was almost J torn off from the shoulder. — * Tribune*