A Squall Tore Through Seattle—and a Husband Saved His Wife from the Bay

Seattle, April 9.—A sudden squall swept over the city yesterday, leaving wreckage on land and water. The most dramatic struggle was in the bay, where a mill worker from Port Blakely and his wife—a full-blooded Native woman—were caught in their twenty-four-foot boat. They had left Port Blakely at high tide to buy provisions for a trip to the Fraser River. The wife had charge of the tiller. When they tried to take down the sail, the squall struck; she lost her head, let go the tiller, and the boat capsized. Both were thrown into the water. The husband twice swam after his wife and brought her back to the bottom of the overturned boat.

“I was bending all my energies to save my wife,” he said. “For that’s the best woman in the world to me, and I think a whole lot of her. I don’t know what I should have done if she had been drowned; I think I would have drowned with her.”

He held to the centerboard well with the numbed fingers of one hand and kept his other arm around his half-dead wife. They were in the water about an hour before a steamer saw them. When the wife was safe aboard and he was hauled up, he fainted from exhaustion. Their boat and all they owned—a stove, three sacks of flour, two feather beds, three double blankets, two quilts, a trunk of clothes, cooking utensils, dishes, and a pocketbook—were lost. He expected to find the boat floating in the bay and to recover what he could before starting on his Fraser River journey.

The storm did great damage to telegraph and telephone wires throughout the city. The whole system was so disorganized that out of over 500 telephones hardly 100 could be used last night. Western Union wires were down here and in Tacoma; to the north there were no wires beyond Fremont; all southern and eastern wires were down. The only wire open was to Franklin. Postal wires were equally demoralized, Snohomish the only point reachable north and Kent south.

The wind did considerable damage on the streets. A large sign of Frederick, Nelson & Munro on Second Street near Seneca was blown down. Plate-glass windows were broken at Fisher Brothers on Teller Avenue and at MacDougall & Southwick’s. A brick chimney on John S. Graham’s residence at Fifth Street was blown down. The tin roof of the Palmer House on Front Street near Pike was curled up like paper. A large plate-glass window at the New England Hotel on Main Street was broken, causing a loss of about $100. Wagons were turned over bodily: a Northern Pacific express wagon on the wharf in front of Ainsworth Dunn’s warehouse, and a milk wagon on Third Street between Madison and Spring. Fruit and news stands also suffered. The loss in the city, apart from telegraph and telephone wires, was estimated at $5,000.

A Seattle & Lake Shore train loaded with shingle bolts was struck by a tree five feet through while at Lake station, fifteen miles north of the city. The car next to the engine was completely wrecked and the rest of the train ditched. A wrecking crew was sent. The place is on the shore of Lake Washington, where several washouts had made rock-filling necessary. Other trees fell on the track and employees were put to work removing them.

Weather observer G. N. Salisbury said he first noticed heavy black clouds near the horizon in the south at 5:30 p.m. The temperature fell from 68 to 41 in about five minutes, the greatest on record. Lightning at 8:15 was followed by thunder. He saw the squall cross the bay and capsize the boat; then he ran to the telephone, but the wires were already down. In his judgment no small boat could live in such a squall.