CATASTROPHE: Hell & High Water

• Share

(3 of 4)

Hooked to a national circuit, WHAS was busy day and night directing local relief workers for miles up and down the river. Frankfort, where 1.500 families took to the hills when the Kentucky river flooded the State capital, was reported to be the scene of the catastrophe's most brutal and piteous event. As the water rose in the Frankfort Reformatory. 2,900 panic-stricken prisoners began fighting.

First everybody fought the guards, 25 swimming out into the river and 24 swimming back when shots were fired over their heads. Then the Negroes fought the whites. National Guardsmen withdrew outside the prison walls, announcing that twelve prisoners were dead and that all had "absolutely gone mad." Governor Chandler had previously putted through the gates in an outboard motorboat. "Get us out of here, Happy!" the inmates yelled. "We're gonna drown if yon don't!" "Happy" yelled back: "It's a hell of a mess, boys, but I'm going to get you out and take care of you!" He then telephoned Washington, for not only troops but also doctors from the U. S. Public Health Service to help set up a prison camp on the State Insane Asylum Grounds. Tennessee. The Cumberland, one of the nation's most picturesque streams, went ugly in Middle Tennessee. At Clarksville (pop. 9.200) the river reached an alltime high of 62 ft.. 24 ft. above flood stage.

Near Huntingdon. Clyde Davis, 35, fell out of an ambulance and drowned in the Obion River while taking his father to a hospital. Earl Kilgore. 35, was drowned when his car unset in a swollen creek. A drowned Negro was found in a Clarksville ditch. From Arkansas South-The Ohio basin's flood waters would not take full effect until this week.