A TOWN ALMOST DESTROYED BY FIRE.

Thames Star, Volume XII, Issue 3808, 12 March 1881, Page 2

A TOWN ALMOST DESTROYED BY FIRE.

The New York papers publish dispatches from Pensacola giving details of a most disastrous fire, which has almost swept that city out of existence. The fire broke out early on the morning of the llth December, in a business house in the centre of the city, and as the only engine in the town was undergoing repairs,. little could be done to stay the flames. The wind was blowing briskly, and the fire swept unmolested across the portion of town where the best* buildings and heaviest stocks are situated. The place seemed for a time entirely at the mercy of the fire. The residents however, finally formed themselves into backet brigades, after several hours' fighting the fire was got under control. Several persons were seriously injured by falling walls. Nine-tenths of the business portion of the city is destroyed. The losses will amount probably to over 1,000,000 dols. A later dispatch states that five blocks in the heart of the city were burnt, involving a loss of over 500,000 dols., possible 750,000 dols. Over 100 establishments are gone, embracing the main business buildings,and turning out about 50 families from their houses. The Custom house, with ita records, Post Office, Merchants' JEbtel, Brent's Bank, both telegraph offices, both newspaper offices, Dunn's Exchange, Wright's dry-goods house, and the county clerk's.office are among the well-known buildings burned. M, one time the loss of the railroad depot and adjacent mills seemed inevitable, and locomotives stood all night under steam ready to draw the company's equipments and other property out of the town. The origin of the fire is unknown. It began in the building occupied by S. Damaiana as a confectionery store, the inmates of. which barely escaped with their lives, two being severely burned, and saved nothing. The calamity is without precedent in the history of Pensacola, and business is almost suspended in consequence.