66 THF FLOOD OF 1 84 3. 



by the current to tlie meadows, a distance of two miles, where 

 it was found after four days search ; the body of the latter 

 was eugulphed amiil the wreck of the masonry of the bridge, 

 and was not discovered until the lapse of two weeks, ihou^^h 

 the most diligent search had been made. Mr. Flounders was 

 in the twenty-first year of his age, ami Mr. Bunting in his 

 nineteenth. Roth of tliese young men gave great promise of 

 future usefulness, and their early and melancholy death 

 proved a severe trial to their numerous relatives and friends. 

 Several persons had left the bridge but a short time before it 

 gave wa>-. 



At the cotton factory occupied by D. & C. Kelly, on the 

 Xew London turnpike, five lives were lost. A frame tene- 

 ment stood immediately below the western walls of the bridge, 

 and between the factory building and the creek. This dwel- 

 ling was occupied by Michael Nolan and his family, consist- 

 ing of his wife, five children, and a young woman named 

 Susan Dowlan. Before any immediate danger from tlie rise 

 in the water was apprehended, Michael and his eldest son had 

 left the house with the view of making arrangements for the 

 removal of the balance of the family. There was no water 

 about the house when the father and son started upon their 

 errand, yet upon their attempt to return, after an absence of 

 less than five minutes, it was not in the power of an>' one 

 present to reach it, much less to render the inmates any assist- 

 ance. The wing walls of the bridge soon gave way. Shortly 

 after this, the house was swept from its foundations — instantly 

 became a complete wreck and all the inmates jierished, with 

 the e.xception of Susan Dowlan. Thus in the space of a few 

 minutes, after they became aware that they were within the 

 reach of danger, a mother and her four children were deprived 

 of their teuijioral existence, leaving a disconsolate husliand 

 and father, and a son and brother to deplore their untimely 

 fate. Julia Nolan, the mother, was thirty-eight years of age, 

 and her children, whose names were James, Thomas, Michael, 

 and Ann, were respectively aged fifteen, nine, five and three 



