Martinique and St. Vincent: Mount Pelee and Island

Ah, the cool, little lake on the top of Mount Pelee. High up there, 4,400 feet above the water, set amid luxurious trees, with vistas of the sea and of the town below in the distance, there could be no more beautiful place. It was always a great place for picnics and outings and gatherings of every kind. There was plenty of room, much pretty scenery, and it was cool and delightful.

No one ever thought of fearing the volcano, which all thought to be extinct. It never smoked, and the only evidence of its activity fifty-one years ago was the placid, little lake, some sixty feet in circumference, right at the very top. The people crowded about by thousands, never dreaming that there was any danger.

A press report which reached Paris May 19th said:

Martinique mails, forwarded just prior to the disaster, arrived here yesterday. The newspapers print a number of private letters from St. Pierre, giving many details of occurrences immediately preceding the catastrophe. The most interesting of these is a letter from a young woman who was among the victims, dated May 3d. After describing the aspect of St. Pierre before dawn, the town being lit up with flames from the volcano, everything covered with ashes, and the people greatly excited, yet not panicstricken, she said:

"My calmness astomishes me. I am awaiting the event tranquilly. My only suffering is from the dust, which penetrates everywhere, even through closed windows and doors. We are all calm. Mamma is not a bit anxious. Edith alone is frightened. If death awaits us there will be a numerous company to leave the world. Will it be by fire or asphyxia? It will be what God wills. You will have our last thoughts. Tell brother Robert that we are still alive. This will perhaps be no longer true when this letter reaches you."

The Edith mentioned was a visitor, who was among the rescued. This and other letters inclosed samples of the ashes which fell over the doomed town. They are a bluish-gray, impalpable powder, resembling newly ground flour, and slightly smelling of sulphur.

Another letter, written during the afternoon of May 3d, says:

"The population of the neighborhood of the mountain is flocking to the city. Business is suspended, the inhabitants are panic-stricken, and the firemen are sprinkling the streets and roofs to settle the ashes, which are filling the air."

These and other letters seem to indicate that evidences of the impending disaster were numerous five days before it occurred.

It is difficult to understand how it was that a general exodus of the population of St. Pierre did not take place before May 8th. Still another letter says:

"St. Pierre presents an aspect unknown to the natives. It is a city sprinkled with gray snow, a winter scene without cold. The inhabitants of the neighborhood are abandoning their houses, villas, and cottages, and are flocking to the city. It is a curious pellmell of women, children, and barefooted peasants--big, black fellows, loaded with household goods. The air is oppressive; your nose burns. Are we going to die asphyxiated? What has to-morrow in store for us? A flow of lava, rain of stones, or a cataclysm from the sea? Who can tell? Will give you my last thought if I must die."

A St. Pierre paper at May 3d announces that an excursion arranged for the next day to Mount Pelee had been postponed, as the crater was inaccessible, adding that notice would be issued when the excursion would take place.

A London press report of May 23d said:

The West India Committee received by mail this morning a sample of the volcanic dust thrown out by the eruption of La Soufriere, Island of St. Vincent. A preliminary chemical examination has been made by Professor D'Albuquerque, who is of opinion that the dust, when mixed with heavy clay lands, might tend to improve the texture of the surface layers, although it has no fertilizing capacity. The dust is very minute, being almost like common flour, but is of a grayish-brown color.

Dr. Langfield Smith also examined the sample and found the dust to consist of volcanic minerals and glass, the former predominating. The minerals were chiefly silicates of iron and magnesia, there being also a considerable proportion of quartz and some potash and feldspar. He compared the volcanic iron with a sample of that which fell on the island in 1812 and found that the two differ greatly. The dust of 1812 is much finer and contains very few mineral crystals, consisting chiefly of dark-brown volcanic glass.

Hardly had the horrors of St. Pierre's destruction been told all over the world before news of a similar, though less terrible, outbreak and destruction, came from the British West Indies, Island of St. Vincent. A press report of Saturday, May 10th, from Kingston, St. Vincent, said:

After numerous earthquakes, during the preceding fortnight, accompanied by subterranean noises in the direction of the Soufriere volcano, in the northwestern part of the island, a loud explosion occurred Monday last from the crater and the water in the crater lake ascended in a stupendous cloud of steam and exploded heavily. The noises grew louder continually till Wednesday morning, when the old crater, three miles in circumference, and the new crater, formed by the last eruption, belched smoke and stones, forcing the residents of Wallibou and Richmond Valley, beneath the volcano, to flee to Chateau Belair for refuge.

The thunderous noises, which were continually increasing, were heard in neighboring islands 200 miles away.