TERRIBLE INCIDENT OF THE CHICAGO FIRE.

Thames Guardian and Mining Record, Volume I, Issue 69, 28 December 1871, Page 3

TERRIBLE INCIDENT OF THE CHICAGO FIRE.

While Madison-street west of Dearborn and the west side of Dearborn were all ablaze, the spectators saw the lurid light appear in the rear windows of Speed’s block. Presently a man, who apparently had taken time to dress himself leisurely, appeared on the extension built up to the second-sto.y of two of the stores. lie coolly looked down the thirty feet between hint and the ground, while the excited crowd first cried ‘ Jump and then some of them more considerately looked for a ladder. A long plauk was soon found and answered the same as a ladder, and was placed at once against the window, down which the man soon after slid. But while these preparations were going on there suddenly appeared another man at the fourth-story window of the building below which had uo projection, but flush from

the top to the ground—four stories and a basement. His escape by the stairway was evidently cut off, and he looked despairingly down the fifty feet between him and the ground. The crowd grew almost frantic at the sight, for it was only a choice of death before him, —by fire or by being crushed to death by the fall. Senseless cries of ‘ Jump! jump! went up from the crowd—senseless but full of sympathy, for the sight was absolutely agonizing. Then for a minute or two he disappeared, perhaps even less, but it seemed so long a time the supposition was that he had fallen suffocated by the smoke and heat. But no ; he appeared again. First he throws a bed, then some bed clothes, apparently ; why, probably even he does not know. Again he looks down the dead, sheer wall of fifty feet below him. He hesitates, and well he may, as he turns again and looks behind him. Then he mounts to the window-sill. His whole form appears, naked to the shirt, and his white limbs gleam again the dark wall in the bright light as he swings himself below the window. Somehow how none can tell—lie drops and catches upon the top of the window below him, of the third story. He stoops and drops again, and seizes the frame with, his hands, and his gleaming body once more straightens and hangs prone downward, and then drops instantly and accurately upon the window-sill of the third-story. A shout more of joy than applause, goes up from the breathless crowd, and those who had turned away their heads, not bearing to look upon him, as he seemed about to drop to sudden and certain death, glanced up at him once more, with a ray of hope, at this daring and skilful feat. Into this window he crept to look, possibly, for a stairway, but appeared again presently, for here was the only avenue of escape, desperate and hopeless as it was. Once more he dropped his body hanging by his hand. The crowd screamed, and waved to him to swing himself over the projection from which the other man had iust been rescued. He tried to do this, and vibrated like a pendulum from side to side, but could not reach far enough to throw liimself upon its roof. Then he hung by one hand and looked down ; raising the other hand, he took a fresh hold, add swung from side to side again to reach the roof. In vain ; again lie hung motionless by one hand, and slowly turned his head over his shoulder and gazed into the abyss below him. Then, gathering himself up he let go his hold, and for a second a gleam of white shot full forty feet, to the foundation of the basement. Of course it killed him. He was taken to a drug store near by, and died in ten minutes.