Sheffield Flood
Letter to the Times Editor
«ReturnTHE SHEFFIELD CATASTROPHE
TO THE EDITOR OF THE TIMES
Sir, - It was my lot to visit a few days since a scene which no one can fully describe, and what certainly my pen cannot do justice to. In the most populous part of Sheffield there are at this moment hundreds - and I might say thousands - of the poorer classes, totally destitute of furniture, cooking utensils, and clothes, who a few days ago had each a comfortable and, I believe, a happy English home. It is a very prevalent and popular idea that the poor people who have suffered are those who have been swept away by the devouring flood. Would that it were so. Alas! These hundreds are but a few. The many are those who on the Friday night went to bed with every humble luxury that their industry and hard savings had earned them, and who were aroused in the dead of night to find their home, their comforts, nay even their common necessaries of existence, destroyed.
From what I witnessed and from what I heard computed I do not believe (though I wish I may be in error) that 2,000,000. Sterling will restore what has been destroyed. Mills, habitations, shops, farms, nay even whole rows of houses and gardens, have been demolished. On Thursday last I saw numbers of the poor - once well to do - actually digging the remnants of furniture - sofas, chairs, cooking utensils, clothes, etc, out of the mud which this fearful deluge left on its retreat in the rooms of their cottages. One poor woman whose husband was a grinder, and who kept a small grocer's shop, pointed out to me the mark where the muddy flood had run to within a few inches of the ceiling of her bedroom. The lives of herself and children were saved by her husband knocking a hole through a fortunately rotten ceiling, by means of which they succeeded in getting on the roof, where they had to sit in their night clothes from 1am to 5am, when the waters subsided. This is but one of the many cases of persons who had similar narrow escapes. The roofing of many houses will point out the truth of what they say.
When this fearful flood descended the narrow valley it not only swept all before it for nearly seven miles, but it spread over the whole area of the suburbs at the entrance of the town, mostly inhabited by the poor and labouring classes, to an average height of 9ft.
Had this awful catastrophe occurred at midday, when all the men, women, and children were in the streets and mills, it is computed that not less than 5,000 or 6,000 souls would have perished. I am told that already about 20,000 sterling has been subscribed, but do not for a moment suppose that any such sum will suffice to reinstate matters, or reasonably compensate the unfortunate victims.
It will take thousands even to clear the sewers and drains, which are choked up with mud, trees, debris of property. God grant that no typhus fever or pestilence may ensue! Experienced men fear this.
Let me add, to their honour, that not one murmur did I hear, and that those poor who were in a position to grant shelter to their less fortunate neighbours have done so with a free and willing hand. The suffering poor are always readiest to help their suffering fellow creatures, and nowhere was this more plainly seen than under the shadow of this terrible calamity.
I am, Sir, your obedient servant,
42, Grosvenor-place, March 19. ALFRED PAGET Continued »
