GREAT FIRE IN CONSTANTINOPLE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 73, 16 September 1911, Page 10

GREAT FIRE IN CONSTANTINOPLE.

TENS OF THOUSANDS HOMELESS THROUGH INCENDIARIES' WORK. The most disastrous fire ever experienced in Constantinople ravaged the Turkish capital on July 21 and 22, destroying 0000 buildings, doing damage to the extent of over £1,600,000, jhkl rendering 100,100 people homeless. The fire, which is believed to bo the work of incendiaries, broke out at 2 o'clock in the afternoon, during the fete in celebration of the third anniversary of granting the Constitution, and raged for fourteen hours. Two square miles of the town were devastated. The Ministers of War and Finance had narrow escapes.

Hattalions of troops helped to fight the flames, and at the request of the authorities British, French, Italian and German sailors came ashore to help. Practically nothing was left standing from the great square ill front of the Ministry of War to the Sea of Marmora. Thousands of families lost their homes, and great poverty and distress must ensue. The European quarter, on the other side of the Golden Horn, was at no time in danger, as the lire wis confined to the southern part of the Stamboul.

Shefket Pasha, the War Minister, was injured bv a blazing beam falling on liini. The archives and mobilisation plans of the General Staff, which were stored in one of the houses near the Ministry of War, were saved, although the house itself was burned. A fresh fire broke out later at Balata, the wooden quarter of Stanvboul, at the side of file (iolden Horn, and was not extinguished until ten on Monday night. The total damage is over £1,C00,000. Xo fewer than 0000 houses were destroyed, and 100,000 people are homeless. Forty people are known to have been killed, and many more ;ire missing. More than five hundred policemen were injured. 1.100 people lost their eyesight, and their terrible experiences drove a score mad. Belief in the rumors that the (ire was the work of political incendiaries is strengthened by the fact that the conflagration started simultaneously at more than one point. Ten alleged incendiaries have been arrested. It. is asserted that a pensioned lieutenant was discovered in the act of carrying two vessels full of petroleum, which he poured over articles of furniture. The police have found a quantify of inflamI mablc materials under-both the bridges spanning the (iohlen Horn.