366 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. [1843. 



and with it George Hargraves, his four older children and brother 

 William ; his wife, with the youngest child in her arms, being in 

 a corner of the room where the flooring was not entirely carried 

 away. William Mas carried down the current half a mile, where 

 he fortunately found a place of safety in the branches of a 

 standing tree. Shortly after, George, with his children, floated 

 by him on a bed, and, as he passed, cried out, " hold on to it, 

 William," Scarcely had George given this admonition to his 

 brother when he and his four children were swept from their 

 position on the bed and engulfed beneath the turbulent waters 

 of the flood, not to rise again. After Jane, the wife of George 

 Hargraves, had sustained herself on a mere niche of projecting 

 flooring, with her child in her arms, during five hours, she was 

 rescued. Thomas Wardell Brown, his wife and child, occupied the 

 other demolished dwelling, but were saved by taking a position 

 on a portion of flooring corresponding to that on which Jane 

 Hargraves stood, but of much less dimensions. This was the 

 only i)ortion of their dwelling not carried aivay. 



A short distance above Sherman's upper factory, a double 

 frame house, occupied by William Tooms and James Rigly and 

 their families, was floated down the stream and lodged against 

 the wheel-house of the factory, in a position opposite to a win- 

 dow of the picker-house. Rigly, after placing his wife and child 

 in the second story of the picker-house, discovered that Tooms, 

 (who was sick) his wife and two children were in the garret of 

 their dwelling, the roof of which was partly under water. He 

 immediately broke a hole in the roof and rescued the inmates, 

 one by one, and placed them in the picker-house. In half a 

 minute after he returned the last time, their late dwelling was 

 whirled over the wheel-house, dashed to pieces and carried down 

 the stream. 



Edward Lewis, Esq., and his son Edward, were placed in a 

 situation of great peril. They were in the third story of the 

 grist-mill when the building began to yield to the flood — their 

 paper and saw-mill having previously been swept away, and a 

 current of great depth and velocity was passing between the mill 

 and their dwelling, across which was their only chance of retreat. 

 A considerable part of the walls of the mill gave way, and the 

 roof and timbers fell in confusion around them, but fortunately 

 enough of the building remained firm till they were rescued by 

 means of a rope. 



On Chester Creek seven human beings were deprived of their 

 lives by the flood, and many others were placed in situations of 

 great jeopardy. 



Mary Jackson, a colored woman, while assisting her husband 

 to save floating wood, near Flower's mill, was overtaken by the 



