CHRISTMAS EVE TRAGEDIES.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18266, 27 December 1924, Page 11

CHRISTMAS EVE TRAGEDIES.

♦ CANDLE STARTS FIRE. MAM* DROWN WHEN PAM BURSTS. t,ST ci»L»—xssocuTioK—corraiaw' (HUTU'S TSLSQIUfS.) (Received December 26th, S.lii p.m.) NEW YORK, December 2". A message from Abingdon (Virginia) reports that 2i« persons were killed and many injured through the breaking of a dam on the Holston River. ("Aiors.") NEW YORK, December 2,". Another account says that. 12 were drowned at Parkmartown on Christmas Eve, and CS are still seriously ill. Tho emergency dam stemming the Holston River for the purpose of supplying water for tho local chemical works broke down, flooding the town and carrying hundreds of houses downstream, and drowning thoso who were caught unawares. Others wore seriously blinded owing to the water being polluted bv alkali discharge from the chemical works. Another disaster, involving the loss of a large number of lives, occurred in a widely separated section of tho country. Thirty-six men, women, and children were burned to death, and forty others so seriously injured that few of them arc expected to recover, in a fire which destroyed the country school at Hobart (or Hobbswitch), in Oklahoma, on Christmas Eve. An entertainment was in progress when, it is believed, a lighted candle on a Christmas tree started the fire. The extremely cold weather, which has been gripping the country everywhere, had frozen the water supply, making the efforts of the fire-fighters unavailing. The attempts of parents and childron to crowd out of tho burning building caused tho narrow exits to bocome congested, many being trampled and crushed to death before being burned.