Death Raced the Flood down to the Sea

THIRTY-FIVE years ago, on October 28, death rode the waters of half a dozen streams of the Lower Mainland. Rain had fallen— torrential rain— for hours, piling up a total of 5.74 inches of precipitation between midnight,Thursday, October 27, and the similar hour of Friday, October 28, 1921. The Squamish River over-flowed its banks and inundated a portion of the Howe Sound community of that name; the waters of the Coquitlam went on the rampage, carrying away both the CPR railway bridge and the traffic span in Port Coquitlam; and the Pitt River had flooded the flat -marginal lands known as Pitt Meadows and Yennadon. Several persons were lost in these flash floods,and at Port Coquitlam the casualties might have been heavier but for the heroic work of several newspaper reporters.

The most terrible story of that ghastly night, however, was written in two minutes at Britannia Beach, on Howe Sound. There, death came to 37 persons and 15 were mangled and seriously injured as a result at one of the most sudden and devastating disasters of its kind in British Columbia. Britannia Beach was a model little mining and milling camp. The big floatation tank that concentrated the ore from the workings of the Empire's biggest copper mine, sprawled up a steep hillside to the southeast of the orderly community of some 300 people. The men at "The Beach" worked in the mill, or the company's big departmental store, the shops and in shipping the concentrates to Tacoma for smelting. There had been an accident in the mine; Basil Dormer had been killed and his body was awaiting burial, but L. C, Craig had been rescued after having been imprisoned in the workings for several days by a cave-in. The mill had been closed down for a few days.

William (Billy) Lonon, a happy, industrious Englishman, a veteran employee in the mill, was asked to act as night watchman while the mill was idle. Billy Lonon was an exceptional sort of man. He had, as a youth, been a coachman, a valet and butler in New York; then he had married and had come to British Columbia to become an expert smelterman at Van Anda and at Ladysmith. He later worked in the Extension coal mines before coming to Britannia. Now it was 9:30 p.m., and Lonon had just completed a round of the plant and community, splashing through puddles, as the rain fell in an almost solid sheet. He looked in at the boiler house and dashed out into the night. He had heard an ominous sound above the wind and the beating of the rain, a rushing, creaking, hissing sound— and he ran towards it. As he ran, even in the flickering illumination of the town lights he could see a great, white-crested wall of water, hovering like a ghost above the rocky gulch through which Britannia Creek poured its ordinary peaceful waters. Lonon shouted warnings as he ran; called for people to flee from the approaching destruction. On he ran— and the wave engulfed him. Billy Lonon died in a futile attempt to save others. So, too, Jim Emmott gave his life. He and Bert King saw the water pile up and spew out of the rock-ribbed channel over the little town. They, too, called out warnings and sought to alarm the inhabitants. They could have saved themselves, but thought first of others; Jim Emmott died, but King, badly bruised, was carried for some distance by the torrent and was then cast aside to safety.

There were 110 homes on the townsite, and of these more than 50 were beaten to splinters; were torn apart, or were carried down to the sea. At first it was thought that the main dam, back in the hills had been carried away. Later it was learned that this had held a fill. But the fill, crossed by a mining railway, had impounded so much water that a lake had been formed. The big culvert, considered ample for any emergency, had become blocked with debris, and the whole fill went out, releasing the imprisoned water in one great wall.

It was getting dark when searchers saw what looked like only a big limb torn from a forest giant floating amid the other debris of the flood. Then a person with keener eyesight saw that the great branch seemed to have something in its grasp. They investigated—- and found a miracle. The limb had clutched a baby's cradle. It held it from sinking or tipping over. Inside was a tiny child. Two twigs had forced their way into the crib and had pinioned its head so that it could not twist and turn and upset the strange craft. So gentle had been the tree that the child's temples were not cut, but the little one was saved, the only survivor of an entire family.

| Little Jack Farrington was another child who was orphaned and whose escape bordered on the miraculous. Mr. and Mrs. J. W. Farrington and their daughter and two boys had gone to bed when their house was demolished. As the building collapsed upon them, in some manner young Jack was thrown out through a window into the storming waters. A natural swimmer, he bravely stuck it out, and a log came upon him. He grasped it and hung on to it, until it was carried against some obstruction, breaking Jack's left arm. He was found by rescuers and was sent to Vancouver, General Hospital on the next boat. Word was sent to Vancouver and early the next morning Dr. Laval Leeson, assistant medical superintendent at the Vancouver General Hospital, mobilized a team of doctors to accompany him to Britannia Beach. They were Dr. George E. Goosetrey, Dr. Gerry, Dr. G. S. Goodwin and Dr. McFayden. Eight nurses were recruited from the Nurses' Home on Bute Street, and they arrived at their destination at noon on board the steamer Capilano.

Dr. A. M. Menzies and Nurse M. Theonen, in charge of the little company hospital at Britannia Beach, had worked throughout the night. This was despite the fact that Dr. Menzies, himself, had a narrow escape from death. He had been caught in the flood and had been whirled along for some distance. He managed to escape, however, only bruised. He refused to heed his own injuries, and was soon at work trying to rescue others. Miss Murphy, a school teacher, was another who had a narrow brush with death. She was in her home when it was picked up and hurled along toward the Sound. She was rescued from her window just as the house was being pushed into tidal waters.

Archie Mathieson, manager of the store, and his family were entertaining a friend, Miss Mary Barclay, from North Vancouver, when their house was torn from its foundations and carried for several hundred yards. By good fortune it stuck against a boulder and was held for a time. Mr. Mathieson was able to wade ashore with his wife, daughter and guest.

So it was in those few minutes when death poured down the little community of Britannia Beach; death came suddenly, and those who survived will never forget the stark terror of that night, when destruction poured down from the mountains. Nor will Squamish, or Port Coquitlam, Pitt Meadows or Yennadon forget the time of the floods of October 28, 1921.