THE CHICAGO HORROR.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXV, Issue 38, 13 February 1904, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE CHICAGO HORROR.

DTlie awful theatre-tragedy which darkened the last hours of the old year an America sent a responsive "thrill of horror through this country. Whether the disaster had any effect upon the attendance at London theatres last evening is hard to say, because fluctuations in tlie theatrical market frequently arise from unknown causes?. Certainly there was a diminished attendance in many pita and although not nearly to the same extent as after the terrible lire at Exeter theatre in 1887. The memory of that conflagration is still vivid in the minds of English people. The theatre was a new structure, built to replace one which had been burned down in the previous year; and, like the Iroquois theatre, it had not been long open when it was overtaken by the same tragic fate. The Exeter theatre fire involved an appalling sacrifice of human life. The fire broke out during the performance of G. R. Sims' metodrama "Romany Rye." In the middle of the fourth act the drop scene was observed to fall rapidly. Immediately after the canvas was puffed right out into the stalls and pit, and the dazed house became aware of a mass of flames and shower of sparks. Shrieks of '"Fire, fire!" were raised, and then in the headlong rush for the doors ensued one. of the most awful scenes ever witnessed within the walls of a theatre. Within three minutes the building had been converted into a furnace. Flames shot up through tfh.c roof over the stage, volumes of smoke were poured from every window, women threw themselves into the street from side balconies, 40 feet tip, and the flat leads were crowded with human T)eings, maddened with terror and shrieking for help. Ladders, were happily, fetched with all speed from adjoining yards, and most of those who had climbed outside the building were taken down in safety. But within the theatre the scenes were such aa Chicago has just witnessed. The most fatal crush occurred at an- angle in the first flight of stairs from the gallery. Here, when at last the rescuers were able to enter, a t?rrible heap of bodies was found piled up, and bearing evidence of the ghastly fight for life which must have followed the stampede. This fire at Exeter involved the sacrifice of some 200 lives. Vienna, Paris, and other Continental cities have also had their theatre-tragedies during the past century. the first-named experiencing as dreadful a holocaust as that of Chicago. London has beon more fortunate. During the last hundred years not a life has been lost in ri London theatre through fire.