Thus there started a conflagration that consumed
over a million dollars' worth of property. The valuable part of the
property, it must be confessed, was in the form of goods, is the light
canvas and wooden shacks were of little worth. Possibly the fire
consumed enough germs and germ-breeding dirt to pay partially for
itself. Before the ashes had cooled, the enterprising real estate owners
were back reerecting the destroyed structures.
This first fire was soon followed by others, each intrinsically severe.
The people were splendid in enterprise and spirit of recovery; but they
soon realized that not only must the buildings be made of more
substantial material, but also that fire-fighting apparatus must be
bought. In June, 1850, four hundred houses were destroyed; in May, 1851,
a thousand were burned at a loss of two million and a half; in June,
1851, the town was razed to the water's edge. In many places the wharves
were even disconnected from the shore. Everywhere deep holes were burned
in them, and some people fell through at night and were drowned. In this
fire a certain firm, Dewitt and Harrison, saved their warehouse by
knocking in barrels of vinegar and covering their building with blankets
soaked in that liquid. Water was unobtainable.
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