Copyright USGenNet Inc., 2017 All Rights Reserved USGenNet Data Repository Please read USGenNet Copyright Statement on this page: Transcribed and submitted by Linda Talbott for the USGenNet Data Repository http://www.us-data.org/ =========================================================================== Formatted by USGenNet Data Repository Chief Archivist, Linda Talbott All of the above information must remain when copied or downloaded. ======================================================================= Alton Evening Telegraph Tuesday, January 8, 1884 BELLEVILLE'S FIRE DEPARTMENT Father GOUGH, of Belleville, lays the blame of the great loss of life by the burning of the con- vent to the inefficiency of the fire department. He says: I am satisfied that if we had had ladders long enough everybody in the building could have been saved - there need not have been a single life lost. The firemen had no ladders that would reach beyond the second story, and I think it was their fault that the entire building was burned. I told them to get their streams into the centre of the building where the fire was and to fight the fire there, but they would not do it; they turned their streams so as to drive the flames into the west portion of the building. If they had worked pro- perly they might have kept the fire out of that part of the building." While Father GOUGH'S criticism may be just, the managers of the institution are also culpable, if, as is asserted, they had made no provision for the safety of the inmates in case of fire. ================================================================