A DISASTROUS EARTHQUAKE. Loss of Life and Property in the Vale of Cashmere.

Te Aroha News, Volume III, Issue 109, 4 July 1885, Page 3

A DISASTROUS EARTHQUAKE. Loss of Life and Property in the Vale of Cashmere.

Lont)ON, June 2. —Despatches from Bombay state that news has just been received there of a disastrous earfchquako in Cash mere, a country of India, The seismic shocks began on Sunday, and have continued at intervals of 10 minutes ever since The shocks wore very severe at Serinagur, one of the capitals of Cashmere. The barracks, in which several hundred soldiers were quartered, were completely destroyed, collapsing so suddenly that nearly half of the soldiers were imprisoned in the debris, Fifty are known to have been killed, while fully 100 are more or les? injured. A portion of the city has been demolished, while very few of the remaining buildings escaped injury, many having large rents made in them. The peoplo became panic-stricken shortly after tho disturbances began, and fled from the city, taking refuge in boats and tents in the open fields. The total number killed and wounded is not yet known, nor the full extent of the damage done, owing to tho interruption of tho working of telegraph wires. It is feared the loss of life will be heavy, as latest information from there calls for holp, saying hundreds of animals have been killed aod the distress among the people was very great. The torrified inhabitants are now camped in tho fields that surround the town. Serinagur is noar tho centro of the valo of Cashmere, and tho whole country hag experienced terrible earthquake shocks. The damage caused throughout the valo is enormous. The loss of cattle alone is very great, and tho affrighted, people seem to be helpless. Succour is being sent to them as rapidly as tho Indian authorities can organise relief. Many of the houses, on account of tho large rents in the walls, must be razed to the ground. The shocks have not yet ceased, and this fact greatly retards the work of rescuing the people pinned down in the debris, and it ia feared many of those must perish before they can be reached by a relief party.

Skrinagur, June 2.— A mosque in the little town of Sopuv, twenty miles north of here, was demolished by the earthquake, and 200 persons killed.

London, June s—An5 — An official despatch from Serinagur gives the number of killed and wounded by the earthquake there on Sunday and Monday last as follows : Killed, 87 ; wounded, 100. Official reports have not been received from other points in the Vale of Cashmere affected by earthquake shocks, and until they come to hand the full extent of the calamity cannot be known. Unofficial reports, however, are of such an [ alarming character as to make it more than : likely the earthquake will prove even more i disastrous in its effects than the first ) despatches stated. Whole cities and towns in the vale of Cashmere are Bpokeu of fta de-

; stroyed, arid the absence of definite news is i attributed to the demolition of telegraph lines in the general wreck and chaos. In consequence, the magnitude of the calamity and the numbers killed and wounded are ' left for the imagination. A century ago Cashmere contained well on to a million of people, but pestilence and earthquake have reduced the numbers to about half of that amount. In 1828, nine years after the terrible earthquake which submerged 2,000 square miles of land at the mouth of the Indus, a series of earthquake shocks destroyed thousands of people in the famous Valley of Cashmere, and drove other thousands to seek homos in a more peaceful region. After a time some of them camo back to their desolated homes, but now the terrible agony is upon them again. For days together the telegraph tells us that ropeated shocks were felt at intervals of ten minutes, reducing whole villages to ruins. Cashmere lies onclosed in a fold of the Himalayas, with high mountains surrounding it on every side. As in California, the detritus from the mountains has been washed down into the valleys, producing a soil of unexampled fertility Some of the Cashmere wheat fields yield crops which soetn incredible. But with this advantago is coupled a marked disadvantage. Observations with tho pendulum have established the singular fact that the earth's crust is thinner under the Himalaya range than | anywhere else in India, and perhaps than anywhere elso in the world. Why this is, philosophers have not explained, but tho fact seems to be undoubted. It naturally follows that under the Himalayas tho earth's surface pcesonts less resistance to subterranean disturbances.