HOPELESSLY ENTRAPPED.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9041, 6 March 1908, Page 5

HOPELESSLY ENTRAPPED.

TERRIBLE FIRE AT A SCHOOL. CHILDREN BURNED TO DEATH. 152 BODIES RECOVERED.

Received March 5, 9.25 p.m

NEW YORK, March 5.

A fire attended with the loss of life is reported from Cleveland, Ohio. The Lake View School, attended by 360 children, whose ages range from 5 years to 14 years, caught fire and was burned down. The fire commenced in the basement of the building, a six-storied one, during the morning school. The smoke quickly filled the building, creating a panic, all the classes becoming distressed. The children of the upper floors rushed pell mell down stairs only to find the lower corridors already blocked by children from the lower class rooms, all pushing and struggling for their lives. The children in trying to retrace ttheir steps encountered the flames, which destroyed the class rooms. A few minutes later the lower floor i-collapsed, precipitating scores into :the basement.

The teachers struggled bravely to save the children, but were helpless. 'JNine of them were hurt. There was no escape for the children, and the smoke and heat overpowered them. Most of the dead came from the first and second floors. A number of children on the third floor escaped. When the floors collapsed the firemen say that the children were writhing in heaps in the basement. The fire raged for two hours. When the ruins were explored many charred bodies were discovered. Many only were identified by pocket trinkets. The smoke asphyxiated most of the children.

The school wan old and badly constructed.

When the front exit was blocked the children were hopelessly entrapped. One hundred and fifty-two bodies have been recovered. It is feared that many more have perished. An overheated furnace caused the 'Mr p.

The firemen's ladders only reached to thp third story. When the fire alarm sounded the children laughed, thinking it was a false alarm. The teachers directed tfaem to sit quietly. Directly smoke appeared the children stampeded, and it was found that the stairs leading to the hall was packed like sardines with the children lying on top of each other. A few escaped by running over them. A merchant, named Upton, saved 18 of them. Miss Moran, the principal of the Girls' Sehool, who escaped, says that the children made a mad rush for the doors and windows, and it was impossible to keep them in check though they had been taught how to act in the event of fire. There were only two exits, a back one which was blocked, and the other a doorway which was soon blocked with falling children, who were trampled on by those behind. Received March 6, 1.6 a.m. NEW YORK, March 5. Hundreds of frantic parents assembled, and workmen from the factories came to assist at the fire.

A man trying to drag bis daughter out of the pile of children wedged in the doorway pulled her arms out of their sockets.

Several children in jumping from the third storey were instantly killed. Others were caught in the arms of spectators, and though badly hurt escaped death. Numbers were rescued through the windows in the back of the building. The firemen by means of the fire es:apes rescued some of the children in the window?, but the flames sweeping up the staircase soon enveloped the building beyond control. The firemen played the hose on the children piled up in the front doorway, and tried to extricate a few. Even this was soon impossible owing *,o the fearful stench from the burning The police used force to keep distracted parents back.