The State Journal from Raleigh, North Carolina • Page 5

Friday, Aiiiiiist 11, THE STATE JOUNAL Newc From Camp Glenn How the Mountains Slid Down Into the Valleys from wet ground loosening the roots, etc. THE first panic over food shortage has passed, there being no danger of it, since if all the crops in this region were lost it would not affect the market price of foodstuffs elsewhere, and transportation will soon bring a normal supply. But there was temporary darkness from shortage of kerosene. In a few localities, Linville Falls station for one, supplies have had to be "toted" in by men on foot going across the mountains four or five miles. At that place the railway superintendent has detailed men for this purpose and allowed them their time for bringing in family supplies That some of the destruction is due to the clearing of land in the mountains is not to be doubted, for the cleared lands released the water faster and chocked the water courses quicker than if the torest had not been cleared.

However, the forest-clad mountain sides went with the clearings and independently of them, almost as many bad slides being in wholly forested areas as in cleared land. The sides of Hump-back and Honeycutt, above the North Fork of the Catawba, where the worst destruction was rlone in this locality, are streaked with frequent slides of great depth, 100 to 150 yards wide, and some much larger, and all through solid forest, where valuable hardwood timber stood, and had been standing for more than 200 years. These great trees were brought to the bottom, leaving ugly gashes behind, to be washed deeper by succeeding rains. The total rainfoll for July has been the incredible amount of 41.76 inches, for rain has fallen on 22 days during this month. The worst ruin and the most complete devastation in this region was in the beautiful valley of the North Fork of the Catawba, between Humpback and Honeycutt mountains on the west and Linville Mountain on the east.

This pretty little stream rises on Humpback and falls about 2,000 feet in about seven miles to Linville Falls station. It drains a large mountain area on both sides and the rain of the night of the 15th seems to have been heaviest in that area. 'The waters rose so rapidly and slides were so numerous and unexpected because hitherto unknown to the settlers, that they had scant time for escape. Some of them barely made their way to higher land in time, taking nothing with them and spending the night in the terrifying darkness and deluge, in momentary fear of being caught in a slide. One family, that of Walter McGee, became separated and two of the children and grandmother were lost, only the grand father surviving.

The power and freaks of the flood as it swept down this narrow valley are amazing and terrifying. Most of the rich tillable land, which certainly had been many hundreds of years in forming, was swept away perfectly clean to the rock and gravel, taking trees, houses and road, in places a depth of 15 feet and varying in width from 500 feet to nearly half a mile. A few places escaped, but most of the best land on the whole length of this stream from its source to its confluence with the Catawba near Marion, more than 25 miles, is gone and in its place is sand and rock waste, reducing the value from $200 an acre to nothing. Some families have absolutely nothing left, others will try to stick it out on what tillable acres remain to them. In this valley the C.

Railway suffered heavy losses, including the bridge over the North Fork, which is holding them back. The wagon road all through this valley was rendered impassable, so all the people were and are quite shut off from the outside world except by going on foot. From Camp Glenn comes the good news that life in the open, with the salt air, good sanitary conditions with the daily drills and cross country hikes, have hardened and seasoned the boys in khaki so that they will be ready to go to the border when they are needed. The physical condition of the men has improved over a hundred per cent, it is said. Uncertainty of moving time keeps the men constantly guessing, but they realize how fortunate they are as compared with the men who went without training or equipment.

The Third Infantry Band are trying "to make mansions out of their quarters" as they say. The neat plots of ground are bordered witli white shells and hardy shrubs line the company street; the tents have floors and a porch platform. Friday last was pay day at Camp Glenn, which was an encouraging experience I'or the men. The first brigade of North Carolina troops will be reinforced shortly by two companies of engineers from Wilmington and Charlotte. The organization of three machine gun companies will be finished by August 10.

It is expected that the commands of sixty-five men each will be made up from the three infantry regiments. If the military situation will permit, the discharge of bona fide college students from the service will be allowed in meritorious cases after September first. Applications after that date will he passed upon individually. Private Lydall Bacon, Compan Third Infantry, shot himself in the head Sunday morning, and was found in his tent, lying across his cot with rifle between his knees, directly after a rifle shot was heard outside. He lived for an hour.

Suicide was the verdict after a complete investigation was made by General Young. For some time Private Bacon had been dissatisfied and depressed according to Captain Jenkins, his cousin, company commander. He was given prompt medical attention. He was '6'2 years old, born in Granville, enlisted in Henderson May 15, 1915. He was single and his remains were sent to Henderson, accompanied by Captain Jenkins.

Dock Head, cook Company Second Regiment, died suddenly Sunday morning at five o'clock after a hemorrhage of the lungs, with which he was taken fifteen minutes before. He was one of the best cooks in the brigade, and was serving his second enlistment. The remains were sent to his mother in Goldsboro, accompanied by the regimental chaplain, Capt. Robeson, and Lieutenant Roberts, and a detachment of six men from Company D. Major Turner was in charge of arrangements for the reception to General Laurence Young, and the military ball in the Atlantic Hotel on Monday night.

The receiving line was composed of General Young and his staff, the camp administration staff, the Colonels and Lieutenant Colonels of each regiment. All officers in the receiving line were accompanied by ladies, and appeared in their service uniforms. After a grand march, participated in by the officers of the command the dance was opened to enlisted men and the general public. At four o'clock Tuesday, the brigade passed in review before the regular army officers now stationed there, guests of the occasion including President Young, of the Norfolk Southern and other railroad officials. On the part of the Raleigh Rotary Club, Colonel George L.

Peterson on Tuesday delivered to Captain Albert Cox a sword, the gift of that organization to its former president. The (Continued on page 11.) developments, revealing the possibilities for which they must prepare. Most of the important power plants in this section of the State are alive but crippled, and will require costly repairs. Cotton mills and other industries by the score are either washed away or filled with mud and debris that will put them out of business for weeks or months, repairing damage to buildings and machinery. All means of communication, by railway, wagon road and horseback, telegraph and telephone, were more or less cut off and are being slowly restored, usually temporarily, pending the raising of money for permanent construction.

The railways are going ahead with all possible speed to restore traffic, but it will take months some places to get the lines to working as before, and the restoration will not be complete in some of the mountain sections in much less than a year. Trains will be running this week on all but the moutain sections of the C. O. from Linville Falls to Altapass, 14 miles, and from Marion to Black Mountain on the Southern, though some of the latter may be overcome. The gaps in the Southern, where bridges are gone, are being filled by transfers and ferries are under construction or in use, pending the build-, ing of bridges.

To the north of us the damage was not so great, so the 0 O. is running to Altapass and the lines out of Johnson City in all directions were unhurt, Cranberry is the nearest station to be reached from here, thence the little narrow gauge 14 miles to Pineola is being repaired. THE highway problem is a most serious one in the path of this devastation, for the destruction is beyond the ability of the mountain counties to repair. They are planning to vote bonds to the extent of their authority to rebuild the most necessary roads and bridges, but they will have to have help or get along without some roads they have heretofore had. In Burke county, it is not likely that a single bridge of any kind is left standing.

It is hoped to get some of the Federal road appropriation for this purpose. Mail routes have oeen suspended in places, owing to the impossibility of getting over the roads, as well as to the suspension of railway service. This place is a fair illustration of the common fate. The suspension of the C. O.

deprived us of the best connection 7 miles distant, but now a horseback trail has been opened, following the crest of Linville Mountain and down its side to a place in the old road about half way to the station, where it it-, being cleared for travel. Meanwhile, the mail comes around by Johnson City to Cranberry and thence by very uncertain and unreliable means to Pineola and here on horseback. Daily papers are at a high premium, the latest we have had to date being of the 24th, though we should have Knoxville and Charlotte papers of the 28th last night. All mails are from a week to ten days out of time, and parcel post nearly suspended. The distress that loss of crops, lands and homes has brought to some families will be relieved, temporarily at least, by the immediate employment of every man willing to work on railway and road building.

Some families were simply set out of doors in the night without warning, and lost everything they possessed. All crops are more or less damaged, gardens rotting and washed, hay, the best local crop, ruining from interference with cutting and being buried in mud, fruit trees tipped over kT KITING from Linville Falls to The Charlotte Observer under dale of August 4, 1916, F. W. Bick-ncll gives the following graphic description of the havoc wrought by the recent flood in that section of the State: Except while at sea before the days of wireless or a hundred miles from a railway, camping in the Rocky Mountains, we have never been so far removed from connection with the outside world as since the great flood of two weeks ago. We are only just beginning to learn something of the extent of the destruction wrought by this unprecedented deluge, and looking deeper, we realize that while it is undoubtedly true that such descent of water has not been known in this region before for more than a hundred years, such an infinitesimal period of time is nothing in the history of these old, old mountains, for they show evidences of such work before.

This is the way they have been worn down, that these sharp ridges have been made, and also some of the many "benches'' on the mountain sides and at what is now the foot of the mountains. When a famous geologist who visited this place a few years ago looked long and wor-shipfully at these many proofs of un-equaled age and said: "You know none of the authorities put the age of these mountains at less than a hundred million years, and some of them go much farther," he was then seeing some of these evidences of erosion, this leveling action of water, that we are now feeling. RAIN had been falling continuously for ten days, the last two days 6.9 and 15.3 inches respectively by the standard rain gauge, a total of 35 inches for the first 16 days of July. The ground on the hillsides as well as in the bottoms was so saturated that it could not hold more, so when the awful down-pour came about midnight the 15th, and kept up for several hours, the mountains in many places, especially in depressions, let go their soil accumulations of hundreds of years and down it went, sometimes 2,000 feet, gathering force and depth as it fell; taking forest and cleared land alike, and burying the valleys gelow in a mass of rock, sand, clay, trees, that sometimes lodged and sometimes was washed on by the gathering flood and taken many miles below. There was so much water in the watercourses that it could carry off in solution an incredible load of dirt and still roll great rocks and float any amount of timber, houses and any other objects that came in its way.

Two very heavy millstones from one of our mills were carried downstream 20 rods. A 14-foot line shaft two inches in diameter with a pulley attached, went half a mile. A carload of chairs was taken from a factory and put into a dairy barn twelve miles away. Unnumbered houses floated down the Catawba intact; after the bridges went out. All fords and channels of streams are changed, especially if near bends or other obstructions.

At once place in the bend a great rock bar was built up from comparatively small stones being carried by the flood and dropped when the force of the current struck a bend in the river. This has been a sharp lesson to hydraulic engineers, correcting some theories and giving pause to some plans. The man whose bridge or dam stood this test is feeling mighty good, for few there are to make such boast. The demonstration has been worth millions to prospective power.