FIRE AT OXFORD.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1871, 21 February 1880, Page 3

FIRE AT OXFORD.

About one o’clock yesterday a fire was seen in the upstairs window of Mr G. Hathaway’s store, by a girl at Mr Love’s hotel. In a very short time there were not less than about seventy persons present, but there was a limited supply of water, or rather, the water had to be wound out of the deep wells, and in a few minutes the whole of Hathaway’s store was in a flame. Mr Welle, station-master at East Oxford, says that when he first noticed the fire it was in the form of a black smoke about the thickness of his arm issuing from the building, but before he could run from the platform to the store the whole seemed to be in a blaze. When he reached the store he opened the bedroom window, and threw out the bedding, &o. By this time the Town Hall, which is only a few feet from the store, had become ignited, and in a few minutes the whole was burned down, but not before the furniture, scenery, and piano in the hall had been removed. Erom the commencement to the time when the whole of the building fell in could not have been more than twenty minntes. Great credit is due to the women and girls of the neighborhood for the spirited way in which they worked, drawing and carrying water, to the burning buildings, nor did they cease until the whole of the fire was quenched and all danger passed. The loss on Mr Hathaway’s store, including building, stock, furniture, &0., is not less than £IOOO, which is partly covered by insurance in the New Zealand and National ofiices as under : New Zealand, £525 on stock and furniture : National, £IOO on the building. The Town Hall is insured in the South British for £3OO. The building cost over £6OO.