From the 4 November 1871 issue of Harper’s Weekly:
CHICAGO IN RUINS.
Two weeks ago we gave our readers a broad view of the beautiful Garden City as it was before the great fire. Last week our stories of sketches presented the greatest disaster of modern times—Chicago in Flames. In the present number we give graphic pictures of her desolation. Happily these last will present but short period of her history. The work of restoration has already begun, and will be pushed forward with a celerity and vigor of which the world has seen no example.
Rush of fugitives through Potter’s Field toward Lincoln Park
4 November 1871
Sketch by Theo R. Davis
The burned district comprised an area of about three and a half square miles, containing about twenty. two hundred acres—about one·sixth of the city tract. They were very costly acres, and the sweeping devastation has destroyed within their boundaries more than twice the value of all that remains.
Our artists in this number help the reader to a complete idea of this desolation. From the stand· point chosen for one of the double-page panoramic views- the roof of Congress Hall, a small boarding hotel on Congress Street, between Wabash and Michigan avenues— the observer looks out upon what was, a few days ago, the busy centre of the busiest city on the continent outside of New York. At our feet the ruin commences with the shapeless debris of Terrace Block—eleven splendid marble dwellings, once the principal adornment of the lake front. To the southernmost dwelling, that of Hon. J. Y. SCAMMON, was attached a choicely kept garden, extending across the block between Wabash and Michigan avenues. Congress Hall is now the improvised C’ustom-house. The adjoining small Michigan Avenue Hotel is the largest hotel left in the city. In the cherished shrubbery workmen are busy erecting temporary quarters for the wholesale grocery store of one of Mr. SCAMMON’S tenants, burned out below Randolph Street. Wabash Avenue was recently the street of churches. The ruins of several of these late beautiful structures are shown—the First Presbyterian, St. Paul’s Universalist, Trinity, and, farther away, the Second Presbyterian and the Cathedral of St. Mary. Thc long railroad pier stretches in front of the park basin, but it terminates in a tract shorn of all depot structures.
From where we stand we look into the ruins of the Court-house, of Honorc’s Building, the Custom-house, the Tribune building. Further to the left are the stately broken facades of the Pacific Hotel and the Bigelow House. Between them, and throughout the wide area, all smaller buildings have disappeared. The wooden structures were destroyed utterly, and their ashes blown away. All in front of us northward to the river is ruin and desolation, and beyond the river we see, three miles and a half away across the treeless and vacant plain, the woods of Wright’s Grove.
The Burning of Coal Heaps
4 November 1871
Sketch by Theo R. Davis
Come with us to the other scene chosen by the artist . We drive down Wabash Avenue. Not long ago it was gay in its turn-outs, and notable by its great wholesale stores. Now its late most familiar corners are indistinguishable, or only to be made out by landmarks traced with difficulty. We turn into State Street. Here was FIELD & LEITER’S white marble dry-goods palace. There was Booksellers’ Row—a range of great book-stores equaled in no other city in the world. One thing strikes us with astonishment. Two days only have elapsed since the fire, yet so thorough was the unopposed work of destruction that every thing combustible has disappeared. From the debris and from the street pavement ashes, dust, everything the winds could carry, have been blown away. We pause to note how the walls of white marble, the buff limestone of Illinois, the red and olive sandstones of Ohio and Marquette, the speckled granite of Minnesota, and the blue Lockport limestone of New York have suffered almost alike in the fire, whose force is compared by numerous eye- witnesses to that of a blow-pipe. Every thing the power of wind and flame could level has been leveled; every thing it could lift has been swept away. The debris and bare standing walls show few traces of stain. The furious fire consumed its own smoke. All about us are the regular and special guardians of the peace, among them many soldiers. In these heaps of debris lie the treasures of the city, for every bank and all its best places of business were destroyed.
We go forward, pass the tall ruins of the scarred City Hall, cross into the West Division—for the main river has no bridges, and even the Lasalle-street Tunnel suffered in its approaches by the fire. A constant line of horse and foot throngs Lake-street Bridge. We turn into the North Division, shown in the upper panoramic view, and here again we notice how the flames licked up every thing that could burn. Nothing remains. Most of the structures were wood, with plank sidewalks, and the lots are many of them as free of traces of human habitation as if they had never been builded upon. Even the sward has burned up and blown away. Here and there the iron-work of a sewing machine, or a solid piano frame burned out of its case, tell of the industry or taste of some banished household. Where are the seventy-five thousand people that only a few days ago filled the homes and haunts of the North Division? We see a new use for these heavy street grades rising from six to eight feet above the natural surface. Dwellings are being improvised here and there in their sheltering corners; so the shanty has two walls of masonry at least—the street pavement on a level with the roof-tree. The floor of the cellar in which they are built is the old prairie level.
We are now standing just north of the sole remaining house in the burned district of the North Division, that of M. D. OGDEN. From this point of view we look southward for our second panorama of desolation. Roofless and shattered, here is the beautiful Church of the Unity; and in another sketch, we show the Rev. ROBERT COLLYER holding Sabbath service among his stricken flock within this ruined sanctuary. Rare was the spectacle, and rare must have been the improvement of this occasion by that most eloquent of preachers. But it can not be a question of rebuilding, for, if restored today, the Church of the Unity has but one human habitation within a mile of it. Our sketch of the ruin of the North Division tells its own story. It is of interest now as a record of disaster that will be told to the remotest generation of men. It will be doubly interesting as a memento when, a few years hence, our artists take up their pencils to show the rehabilitated city.
The Rev. Mr. Collyer preaching on the site of his church
4 November 1871
After a photograph by Thomas R. Sweeney
Among the many privations to which the inhabitants were subjected was that of a limited supply of water, owing to the destruction of the water-works, and those who lived at a distance from the lake-side suffered greatly in consequence. Many hundreds went a long way, with pans, pails, tubs, kettles, etc., to get water from the large Artesian well in Lincoln Park, from which 550 gallons flow per minute. The water is slightly mineral, but not unpleasant to the taste.
Getting Water from the Artesian Well in Lincoln Park
4 November 1871
Drawing by Theodore R. Davis
One of our illustrations shows a crowd of fugitives from the fire passing through the “Potter’s Field”—on foot, on horseback, in every kind of vehicle- pursued by the rapid flames, which devastated the very abodes of the dead_ The portion where the fire was most destructive was that which the Germans have chiefly appropriated, which lies nearest to the town. The legend of the cheap wooden monuments always begins, Hier ruhet, “here rests.” These headboards are all charred more or less, some of them are burned entirely away; the votive flowers are burned down to the earth in their pots. The mounds of the graves themselves are sometimes half torn away by the violence of the fiery wind, and there are acres where the grass is burned down to the ground. But a far sadder sight than the desecration of the dead is the evidence every where afforded that even this was not a sanctuary for the living. The whole place is strewn with fragmcnts of household goods and gods, abandoned to the dead as the living found that place after place was too hot to hold them. Potsherds, tables, chairs, bedding, and all the impedimenta of a poor German family, one stumbles over at every turn.
(1) Laying the Cornerstone of the First New Building
4 November 1871
After a photograph by Thomas R. Sweeney
We turn from these picturcs of Chicago’s desolation to the gratifying evidence of her energy. The first illustration on our front page shows the laying of thc corner-stone of the first building commenced after the fire- that of Kendalls’ Bank, corner of Washington and Dearborn streets. It was laid Octoher 16 by Mortimer & Tapper, contractors. The localities designated by figures are (l) the cornerstone; (2) Kerfoot’s Block. “Kerfoot’s Block” is merely a rough shanty, about twelvc feet by eight, knocked together the morning after thc firc hy the gentleman whose name it hears, on thc site of his former place of business. His sIgn hears the inscription, “WM. D. KERFOOT: all gone but wife, children and energy.” This example of good heart and pluck was followed by thousands, and really gave tone to the general sentiment of the citizens.
(2) Kerfoot’s Block
4 November 1871
Drawing by Theodore R. Davis
Another illustration shows the work of digging out the safes of the Merchants’ Savings, Loan and Trust Company, opposite the Tremont House. Another hows the burning of the immense heaps of anthracite coal, comprising most of the winter’s supply for the city. The largest coal-yards were along the east bank of the South Branch of the river, and the burning piles were from twenty-five to thirty feet in height. The flames from these heaps, reflected from the clouds, furnished the only illumination of the city during the nights succeeding the destruction of the gas-works, when the streets were patrolled by armed guards for the protection of the citizens against thieves and murderers.
The story of this calamity is not all told in the tale of millions lost. In the course of the destruction of two hundred millions of property, of fifteen thousand buildings burned in the sixteen hours of the great fire of Chicago, what tongue can tell the human suffering in this appalling process of sudden dispossession of one hundred thousand of the population of the city from their homes and their places of business? Nor is the loss of property theirs alone of her history.
Chicago has long been a covet ed seat of enterprise and business, and few with capital and energy in any part of the land or the moneyed world have not taken a venture therein. The loss of incomes, the defeat of investments, the shrinkage of loss of securities, in this wiping out of two hundred million of values, is felt in all parts of th e country and Europe. It wiIl all come back again in time, if not to every loser, certainly to those who believe in the future of Chicago. It will be made a better city than it ever could have become but for this fire. A better building system, a more shapely development, a spirit of enterprise and determination, literally tried as by fire, will bring all these results. The brightest feature of the picture is one no artist’s pencil can show the generous sympathy of the world in the desolation of Chicago, which has opened to its suffering children all hearts a nd all purses in the instant magnificent rivalry of contribution for their relief.
Opening Bank Vaults After the Fire
4 November 1871
Sketch by Theo R. Davis
The West Side Rink, Chicago
General Depot of Supplies for the Suffers by the Fire
Harper’s Weekly
4 November 1871
Sketch by Theodore R. Davis
In the Track of the Conflagration,
Harper’s Weekly
4 November 1871
Sketch by Theodore R. Davis
Clockwise from top left, Where the Fire Began, Post Office and Custom House, Chamber of Commerce and Court House, Land Office Illinois Central R.R., Republic Life Insurance, Masonic Temple Dearborn Street (center).
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