September 21, 2025 • 27 mins
The thunderous crash of collapsing floors, desperate screams rising from beneath rubble, and the horrifying spread of flames that turned rescue into tragedy – these are the sounds and sights of the Pemberton Mill Collapse, one of America's deadliest industrial disasters that has somehow faded from our collective memory.
Against the backdrop of the booming American Industrial Revolution, the Pemberton textile mill in Lawrence, Massachusetts stood as a monument to progress and profit. But on January 10, 1860, as workers toiled in the five-story building, the rearrangement of heavy machinery on the upper floors triggered a catastrophic structural failure. Without warning, the entire building pancaked down upon itself, trapping hundreds of workers beneath tons of brick, timber, and machinery.
What followed was both heroic and heartbreaking. Over 2,000 volunteers worked through the night, desperately digging through debris to reach survivors. For hours, they made progress, pulling the injured and dead from the wreckage. Then, around midnight, a rescue lantern fell and shattered, igniting cotton scraps and pools of machine oil. The fire spread rapidly through the rubble, turning the disaster site into an inferno. Many survivors who had communicated with rescuers just moments earlier perished in the flames, their voices silenced forever.
The final toll would reach approximately 145 dead and 166 injured – victims of an era when profit margins outweighed human safety and industrial regulations were virtually non-existent. The subsequent investigation revealed faulty cast iron pillars, substandard materials, and flawed engineering, yet no one was ever held criminally responsible. The Pemberton Mill disaster stands as a stark reminder of the human cost of unchecked industrialization and the long struggle for workplace safety that would follow.
Join us as we unearth this forgotten tragedy and honor those whose lives were sacrificed on the altar of industrial progress. Their story deserves to be remembered not just as a historical footnote, but as a crucial lesson about the value of human life in our continuing quest for economic advancement.
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Special thank you to Lunarfall Audio for producing and doing all the heavy lifting on audio editing since April 13, 2025, the Murder of Christopher Meyer episode https://lunarfallaudio.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
By the late 19th century, the American Industrial
Revolution was in full swing.
The country was rapidlytransitioning from an
agricultural society to anindustrialized nation.
Driven by thoughts of profitsand the lack of regulations, the
revolution would be far frombloodless.
(00:22):
Safety practices were seriouslylacking, if they even existed
at all.
Child labor laws Not a thing.
Death tolls would reach anannual high, estimated at 35,000
from just industrial accidents.
One of the worst accidentshappened in Lawrence,
massachusetts, at the PembertonMill Tragedy struck that would
(00:45):
claim the lives of over 100employees in 1860.
So what happened?
I'm Andrew and this isHistory's A Disaster.
Tonight we are taking a lookinto the Pemberton Mill Collapse
(01:06):
of 1860 in Lawrence,massachusetts, and tonight's
episode is brought to you byLarry Berry's Cherry Shake Shack
.
If you got a hankering for acherry shake, then come on down
to Larry Berry's Cherry ShakeShack For a shake.
So cool it'll make a fire scene.
Chilly 1860 started out.
(01:33):
Chilly Snow filled the streetsof Lawrence, massachusetts.
Teams of men and their horsesworked to clear the streets so
the hundreds of mill workerscould make their way more easily
to the five mills just over thebridge across the North Canal.
Day in and day out, mondaythrough Saturday, they stomped
(01:53):
across the bridge, kicking offthe snow from their boots before
dawn and making their way backhome hours after dusk.
Most of them, making their wayto the Pemberton Mill, lived
just across the canal in a hugeboarding house.
Things were looking up, businesswas booming and the mill was
extremely busy.
The economy was recovering fromthe panic of 1857 that threw
(02:18):
the nation into a depression.
They were looking forward toanother record-setting year and
plenty of income for the millowners.
Anyways, 1859 had been arecord-setting year for the
mills in the area, and thesemills were some of the biggest
in the world.
While the mills were generatingplenty of income, the workers
(02:40):
not so much.
Income, the workers not so much.
They got paid once a month andsome were barely squeaking by,
so poverty was really kicking afew of them in the ass, with
some newly arrived familiesliving eight to an apartment
with a single bed.
They'd have to work a wholemonth before they would see any
(03:04):
kind of income from the mills,and what they did make wasn't
much.
New employees, mostly children,earned $3 a week, and some of
the top earners, mostly men,since the wage gap between men
and women was in full effect,was around $50 a month, which is
roughly the equivalent of justunder $2,000 today, and this was
(03:26):
fairly typical of the time.
Mill owners were pushing formore profits.
The nation as a whole waspushing for more
industrialization and wasstarting to dominate the textile
markets on a global scale.
The morning of Tuesday, january10th started out like any other,
with the workers stompingthrough the slushy snow and over
(03:49):
the bridge to work.
Before dawn the weather wasturning milder than the previous
week, bringing about meltingsnow.
Both owners, george Howell andDavid Nevins, were touring the
factory.
This was a common occurrenceand a point of pride that they
stopped in often to visit themill.
At least once a week they werethere.
(04:10):
The mill was at full productionand they were looking to expand
operations to the sixth floorattic.
During his morning rounds,david Nevins got to watch as
machines on the fourth floorwere being moved.
During the relocation of themachines, no one gave a thought
(04:32):
to the weight of the machinesand there was even some
difference in opinions on whatthe machines weighed.
There was roughly 40 cardframes weighing roughly a
thousand pounds apiece and eightfly frames which some assumed
weighed about 3,500 poundsapiece, although later estimates
(04:52):
put them at over 6,000.
Captain Bigelow, the architectand engineer who originally
designed the mill, reasonedsince it was safe enough when
the machines were put in, thenthem moving them should cause no
harm to the building, becauseyou know, physics were different
in the 19th century and youdidn't have to worry about
(05:14):
things like oh I don't know,proper weight distribution.
Just stack it all up in onecorner, it'll be fine.
All this moving around made afew of the people on the third
floor a bit nervous, to say theleast.
All the banging and poundinggoing on during the move caused
(05:34):
the whole building to shake andrattle.
As 4.30 approached, the lightcoming in from the large windows
was growing dim.
Asa crew of men went aboutlighting the gas lamps
throughout the mill so theycould keep working on into the
evening.
They didn't get very far.
Less than five minutes after themen on the fourth floor quit
(05:55):
moving equipment, at roughly4.47, a crash was heard on the
fourth floor, followed by alouder explosion as the mill
began falling in on itself, onefloor falling down on the next
and the next.
A wall dropped into thecourtyard as dust was launched
into the air and less than aminute the Pemberton Mill had
(06:17):
fallen.
The sound was heard acrossLawrence, followed by the
screaming.
The dust was mistaken for smokeand the fire department was
quickly on the way, as well asmost of the townsfolk, to see
what happened.
Everyone was drawn in by thestrange noise of the collapse.
The first on scene werehorrified at the sight.
They expected a fire and foundnothing but rubble, rubble and
(06:42):
the screams of the hundreds ofworkers trapped beneath it.
Witnesses across the streetwould later describe the
building as swaying before thecollapse started on the south
end of the fourth floor, wherethe building began to fall in on
itself.
The floors dropped one by one,nearly unbroken, on top of the
(07:02):
next one down.
Mill workers lived and died bywhere they stood.
As the mill collapsed, sometried to jump out nearby windows
.
Others took refuge under nearbylooms and machinery.
The arches of the looms heldback the weight of the falling
timbers and machinery, creatinga safe haven for those lucky
enough to be close by.
(07:24):
Some of those who remainedunharmed or lightly injured
managed to dig their way out ofthe rubble.
Others would remain trappeduntil help could arrive, and it
wouldn't take long for that helpto come.
Over the next few hours, over2,000 people turned up to help
in the rescue, and their taskwas daunting.
They had to clear out heavymachinery, large timbers and
(07:48):
sections of brickwork andmountains of rubble to dig
through.
While they had tons of help,they had no leadership.
They were disorganized andgoing about it all willy-nilly,
making the effort not nearly aseffective as it could have been.
By 5.30 pm the darkness wasgrowing, so bonfires were lit
around the buildings so therescuers could see what they
(08:11):
were doing and continue workingthroughout the night.
They worked all through thenight clearing rubble, tearing
apart equipment to rescuesurvivors, removing the wounded
and the dead from the rubble.
They used ropes and pulleys tomove wreckage aside.
Food and coffee was lowered totrap survivors to help them make
it through the night.
(08:31):
Six hours after the collapse,the hundreds of volunteers were
working their way slowly throughthe debris.
With time and effort a body,living or dead, was pulled out
and sent to City Hall.
It was dark and they werehaving to work by firelight or
by the light of lanterns.
Mr Saunders, the mayor, madesure that kerosene oil lanterns
(08:55):
were swapped out for sperm oillanterns, which were less likely
to cause a fire.
It was already something of amiracle that the gas lamps
throughout the mill had notstarted a fire and they did not
want to take any more chances inan area covered in highly
flammable material, from the drycotton to the machines that had
(09:15):
leaked oil all over them.
They had spread and covered thefallen timbers.
Even with their precautions, theinevitable happened A lantern
being lowered through the rubbleto attract a group of survivors
fell and broke.
The flame from the brokenlantern quickly jumped the
(09:38):
nearby cotton and from fromthere it was unstoppable,
jumping from scraps of cotton tothe pools of spilled oil on the
floor, to the dry timbers inthe wreckage.
The fire raced through therubble.
The once safe spaces, all thenooks and crannies people hid in
to escape the collapse, becameflues for the fire, letting in
(10:00):
air and pushing the fire forward.
Rescuers were pushed back bythe blazing wall of flames.
Survivors, just feet fromrescue, were lost to the flames.
As fire burnt through the rubble, firefighters already on hand
abandoned the dig and raced toretrieve their equipment where
they had left it.
Soon streams of water fromvarious hydrants poured onto the
(10:24):
fallen mill, to little effect.
The rubble worked against theirefforts.
The way the floors fell andlaid at odd angles redirected
most of the water away from theflames.
More streams of water startedpouring in, but the fire raged
unchecked, spreading further andfurther through the debris.
(10:45):
More rescuers were driven backby the flames, forced to abandon
the trapped survivors below.
By midnight a second wall hadfallen the west wall of the main
mill, the northern half thatran from the bathroom tower to
join with the wing jutting tothe west.
This wall carried tons ofbricks onto the Blue House and
(11:06):
the freight cars on the railroadsiding nearest to the
Washington Mills.
The bathroom remained standinguntil later that Wednesday.
The force of the falling wallwas so strong it crushed several
rail cars that had broughtcotton to the mill.
In a short time they wouldcatch fire and eventually be
destroyed.
(11:27):
By 1230, the last livingsurvivors were pulled from the
wreckage.
City Hall was turned into both atemporary hospital and a morgue
.
The severely injured andunrecognizable dead were brought
into different rooms of thecity hall.
One corner of the great roomwas dubbed the dead room and
(11:47):
quickly filled with the brokenand mangled corpses pulled out
of the wreck.
More than 50 doctors fromLawrence and the surrounding
communities were on hand to helpwith what they knew would be a
growing number of casualties.
Women from the area stepped upto help tend to the injured and
dying.
The main hall was turned into ahospital.
(12:08):
Donated mattresses, blanketsand sheets were placed in rows
along three of the walls and by1230 Wednesday morning more than
50 wounded were put there.
Other local gifts arrived fromnearby druggists and homeowners,
including bandages, cordialsand medicines.
Within hours, other donatedgoods were coming in from all
(12:32):
over the region.
The owners of the steamerMinimon Sanford sent 125 sheets
and a supply of lint.
And if you're thinking dryerlint, like I was, well, you're
not too far off.
Lint in 1860 was a soft, fuzzymaterial used as an absorbent
(12:53):
padding, mostly used in treatingwounds.
Cops guarded the door of thetemporary hospital as the crowds
outside got bigger and bigger.
Spectators were coming in bythe train loads.
Wednesday saw over 4,000 comefrom nearby Lowell alone, and
more would continue to pour inover the next few days.
(13:13):
The city of Lawrence would be agiant mass of humanity by the
week's end.
Everyone wanted to help out orsee the site of the disaster.
It's like a train wreck.
Who can resist looking?
When the streets and sidewalkswere filled, people stood in the
ice-covered canal to watch thesmoke still pouring from the
mill.
(13:38):
By Wednesday afternoon, theextent of the damages were being
made clear.
Still standing were the riverbuilding, repair shed and cotton
house.
The river building, also knownas the picker and die house, had
undamaged turbines within it.
2,000 bales of cotton valued at$100,000, had been untouched in
(13:59):
the cotton house.
$100,000 had been untouched inthe cotton house, which would
help make up for at least someof the companies lost when B&M
freight cars loaded withundelivered cotton were
destroyed by fire.
And of course there was morebad news, though.
Fire had destroyed many of theadministrative and archival
records.
When the building collapsed, thepaymaster and clerk had been
(14:21):
working on the December payroll.
Clerk Henry Newhall had leftthe envelopes and list of
employees in his desk.
As he fled the building, theonly thing left was to hope this
sturdy company safe, whichwould hopefully be recovered,
would contain an old payroll.
The newest intact list ofemployees anyone could remember
(14:43):
existing was over five monthsold, dating all the way back to
August 1859.
While not great and far frombeing accurate enough to date,
it would at least make a goodstarting point for a new payroll
to pay out what employees hadbeen owed.
By now Pemberton managers hadtaken control of the site,
(15:05):
derricks were brought in to liftheavy machinery Poor Derrick.
Anyways, a hundred men werehauling rubbish away.
The growing crowd stood out ina second night watching the few
volunteers fresh to the effortsas they slowly lifted charred
material in their grim search.
Thursday, dr Lamb, the countycoroner, called together jurors
(15:27):
to start an inquest into whatcaused the mill to collapse.
Outside, the rain had turned tosnow as firefighters still
poured water down into the massof rubble, and what was now
largely a massive cleanupoperation continued to clear out
the wreckage.
The company's safe was foundand opened that afternoon.
(15:47):
They found some paperwork topoint them in the right
direction for compiling a newpayroll, but it was way far from
complete.
The biggest find in the safe,though, was the original
architectural plans for the mill, which were quickly turned over
to the coroner's inquest.
Neighboring mills were forcedto shut down as either workers
(16:09):
refused to return to work fromfear of another mill collapse or
shut down completely.
After incidents which led topeople fleeing in fear of a
collapse, people that had beenreported as missing came forward
to let the mayor know they wereokay and be removed from the
missing list.
A mass funeral was held for thebodies and partial remains of
(16:31):
nine unidentified dead, who wereplaced into two boxes and the
receiving tombs of the citycemetery.
The city would be filled withthe shrieks and cries of
mourning for days.
By Saturday some semblance ofnormalcy had returned.
All but one mill had reopened.
A road had been cleared throughthe rubble to allow travel
(16:53):
through the area.
The fire was contained, exceptfor burning embers deep within
that would flare up with intenseheat when exposed to the air
With an increase in theworkforce.
13 more bodies were found in therubble.
Only six would be identifiedimmediately.
Black dust from the badlycharred bodies covered
(17:14):
everything.
The dead room floor was pitchblack from all the ash Churches
and cemetery workers preparedfor the coming onslaught of
funerals.
Coffin makers worked tirelesslyto meet the demands for coffins
and boxes for unidentifiedremains.
Most of the crowds started tothin out as onlookers returned
(17:35):
home and families came forth toclaim their dead and wounded.
And families came forth toclaim their dead and wounded.
As night fell, a call to ceasethe dig was made.
They were afraid if they keptgoing in the dark bodies would
be unnecessarily mutilated inthe attempt to retrieve them in
the dark.
(17:56):
Sunday, most of the churches intown were filled.
Side altars were filled withcandles covered in black in
memoriam of the victims.
The ruins had cooledsufficiently by Sunday afternoon
and workers were able to scourthe main building and pulled out
three more bodies from therubble.
On Monday, the man in charge ofclearing the wreckage, th
(18:19):
Dolliver, claimed no more bodieswere to be found and that
prediction wouldn't last long.
At 8 pm, workers removingdebris at the Blue House came
upon one of the final bodies tobe found.
The days following the collapse,newspapers around the nation
ran sensationalized headlinesproclaiming hundreds dead in the
(18:41):
fire.
As they raced to sell morepapers than their competitors,
the 19th century version ofclickbait sold a lot of papers.
Lawrence was still counting andtrying to identify the wounded
and dead, so nobody had afucking clue how many people
were actually dead.
They were just making shit up,which sounds about right.
By 6 pm Wednesday night, thecount was up to 50 dead and
(19:04):
counting.
A group was sent out to canvasthe city and take up a census.
By Sunday the count was up to117 dead, 89 missing and 119
seriously injured.
Financial support was pouringinto Lawrence.
Boston kicked it off by sending$2,000 on Wednesday and another
(19:26):
$3,000 the following day.
That first Sunday after thecollapse, the city.
Clergy's fun drive for the poor, originally meant for something
else, was redirected toPemberton Mills victims.
Grace Episcopal Church aloneraised a thousand dollars.
Tons of gifts were beingarranged by categories and
(19:48):
distributed from City Hall.
Two weeks after the fall of themill a newspaper recorded the
day's count as hundreds ofoutside garments, undergarments,
articles of bedding and bottlesof liniment.
Former employees and survivingrelatives and friends were
informed early in the week thatmanagement had compiled a final
(20:10):
payroll and set up adistribution schedule.
Wages would be given to cover38 workdays from December 1st to
January 10th.
This would be paid out over athree-day period in town.
After digging through availablerecords and reports, based on
what the people canvassing thetown came up with 930 pay
(20:32):
envelopes were prepared.
At 9 30 am on WednesdayPaymaster Clark faced the line
of former employees and ofcourse there had to be at least
one person trying to profit offthe death of another.
The company notice had said themoney due to those who were
(20:54):
killed would be paid to therelatives.
So a woman showed up andclaimed to be Ellen Roach.
Ellen had at first beenreported killed but was then
claimed to be found among theuninjured because a relative who
came for the sum due.
Ellen, upon the payroll of themill, called herself by her name
and was supposed to be the sameperson.
(21:16):
Ellen had been buried inDorchester, massachusetts, and
her next of kin had been given$75 as a death benefit.
There's no record of punishmentfor the woman, nor what
happened to the $10.93 that wasstolen.
So, basically, this womanclaimed to be somebody she
wasn't and made off with 11bucks.
(21:37):
A total of just over $22,000 inpayroll had been paid out over
the three days.
As a coroner of Essex Countysince 1854, william Lamb had
wasted no time in ordering aninquest into the deaths at the
mill.
He convened a jury on Thursday,january 12th, less than 40
(21:57):
hours after the building'scollapse.
At a time when women were notpermitted to provide civic
services, the jury appearedotherwise to generally represent
the community.
Five of the jurors worked inthe building trades, most likely
recruited for the jury due totheir expertise and knowledge.
The foreman, william Wright,who was the service chief
(22:20):
interrogator of witnesses, wasan attorney and an up-and-comer
in Massachusetts North Shorepolitics.
The inquest clerk was CalebSaunders, the mayor's brother.
The younger Saunders maintaineda transcript of the hearing,
which was supposed to be over 40pages long.
However, the only survivingrecord of the hearing comes from
(22:42):
the newspapers.
By the end of the inquest,charles H Bigelow, the architect
and engineer behind thebuilding, was found at fault due
to insufficient testing anddefects in the hollow cast iron
pillars supporting the mill'sfloor.
There was also some concernsover only using two rows of
(23:03):
pillars and not three, alongwith substandard mortar and
supports being used on the wallsof the mill.
The verdict concluded thatthese failures, along with
insufficient testing and designflaws, led to the collapse, and
also that the foundry manager,albert Fuller, was also to blame
(23:23):
for the faulty cast ironpillars.
The jury's findings have beencriticized in the following
years for not explaining why afaulty pillar broke in and, in
domino fashion, all 270 castiron columns went down, taking
with them the mammoth buildingthey helped hold upright.
(23:43):
The reasoning generally heldthat the factory had stood more
than six years without failing,poorly, cast columns or not.
Several investigations haveincluded the possibility that an
unexplained event created acondition that set off the
(24:05):
collapse of the Pemberton'sweight-bearing pillars.
Machine breakage and vibrationhave been suggested, but what
caused the fall is as much amystery today as it was back in
1860.
Now I have a little bit of anissue with this.
They know from eyewitnessaccounts.
The collapse started on thefourth floor, the same floor
(24:28):
they were moving heavy machineryabout without much of a care as
the proper weight distribution.
Hell, they couldn't even reacha general consensus on the right
weight of some of the machines.
It seems pretty obvious to mynon-engineering brain that they
overloaded one of the pillarssupporting the fourth floor.
When that pillar collapsed, itwould have caused a domino
(24:51):
effect spreading out in threedirections Going upwards, the
loss of the fourth floor wouldhave meant the fifth and sixth
floor were no longer supported,so those sections of the
flooring would have started todrop.
Going outwards along the fourthfloor, the loss of one pillar
would have put a greater strainon the other pillars supporting
(25:14):
the floor.
That would now have sections ofthe fifth and sixth floor
coming down on it and addingmore weight to the pillars,
causing them to collapse.
And finally going downwards,when the first part of the
fourth floor fell, its weightwould have slammed down on the
third floor, causing the pillarsto collapse and dominoing from
(25:36):
there as the defective pillarswere being tasked with
supporting more and more weightuntil they inevitably failed and
the entire building fell.
But that's just myinterpretation, but what the
fuck do I know?
There would be no criminalcharges filed and no one would
end up being held accountablefor all the deaths and injuries
(25:58):
caused in the collapse.
For all the deaths and injuriescaused in the collapse.
The original mill would neverbe reopened and officially
closed down in March, after theowners sold off everything they
could.
Within a year of the collapse,nevins bought out Howe and had a
new mill constructed on top ofthe original foundation, a mill
that is still standing over 100years later.
(26:20):
While some lawmakers would tryto pass legislation to push for
better safety standards, nothingwould ever come of it.
It would take more deaths andmore disasters going into the
early 20th century before lawsregarding worker safety and
better working conditions wouldbe passed.
Safety and better workingconditions would be passed, and
(26:44):
that was the fall of thePemberton Mill.
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(27:06):
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Live for today, becausetomorrow is never guaranteed.
Thanks and goodbye.
By the late 19th century, the American Industrial
Revolution was in full swing.
The country was rapidlytransitioning from an
agricultural society to anindustrialized nation.
Driven by thoughts of profitsand the lack of regulations, the
revolution would be far frombloodless.
(00:22):
Safety practices were seriouslylacking, if they even existed
at all.
Child labor laws Not a thing.
Death tolls would reach anannual high, estimated at 35,000
from just industrial accidents.
One of the worst accidentshappened in Lawrence,
massachusetts, at the PembertonMill Tragedy struck that would
(00:45):
claim the lives of over 100employees in 1860.
So what happened?
I'm Andrew and this isHistory's A Disaster.
Tonight we are taking a lookinto the Pemberton Mill Collapse
(01:06):
of 1860 in Lawrence,massachusetts, and tonight's
episode is brought to you byLarry Berry's Cherry Shake Shack
.
If you got a hankering for acherry shake, then come on down
to Larry Berry's Cherry ShakeShack For a shake.
So cool it'll make a fire scene.
Chilly 1860 started out.
(01:33):
Chilly Snow filled the streetsof Lawrence, massachusetts.
Teams of men and their horsesworked to clear the streets so
the hundreds of mill workerscould make their way more easily
to the five mills just over thebridge across the North Canal.
Day in and day out, mondaythrough Saturday, they stomped
(01:53):
across the bridge, kicking offthe snow from their boots before
dawn and making their way backhome hours after dusk.
Most of them, making their wayto the Pemberton Mill, lived
just across the canal in a hugeboarding house.
Things were looking up, businesswas booming and the mill was
extremely busy.
The economy was recovering fromthe panic of 1857 that threw
(02:18):
the nation into a depression.
They were looking forward toanother record-setting year and
plenty of income for the millowners.
Anyways, 1859 had been arecord-setting year for the
mills in the area, and thesemills were some of the biggest
in the world.
While the mills were generatingplenty of income, the workers
(02:40):
not so much.
Income, the workers not so much.
They got paid once a month andsome were barely squeaking by,
so poverty was really kicking afew of them in the ass, with
some newly arrived familiesliving eight to an apartment
with a single bed.
They'd have to work a wholemonth before they would see any
(03:04):
kind of income from the mills,and what they did make wasn't
much.
New employees, mostly children,earned $3 a week, and some of
the top earners, mostly men,since the wage gap between men
and women was in full effect,was around $50 a month, which is
roughly the equivalent of justunder $2,000 today, and this was
(03:26):
fairly typical of the time.
Mill owners were pushing formore profits.
The nation as a whole waspushing for more
industrialization and wasstarting to dominate the textile
markets on a global scale.
The morning of Tuesday, january10th started out like any other,
with the workers stompingthrough the slushy snow and over
(03:49):
the bridge to work.
Before dawn the weather wasturning milder than the previous
week, bringing about meltingsnow.
Both owners, george Howell andDavid Nevins, were touring the
factory.
This was a common occurrenceand a point of pride that they
stopped in often to visit themill.
At least once a week they werethere.
(04:10):
The mill was at full productionand they were looking to expand
operations to the sixth floorattic.
During his morning rounds,david Nevins got to watch as
machines on the fourth floorwere being moved.
During the relocation of themachines, no one gave a thought
(04:32):
to the weight of the machinesand there was even some
difference in opinions on whatthe machines weighed.
There was roughly 40 cardframes weighing roughly a
thousand pounds apiece and eightfly frames which some assumed
weighed about 3,500 poundsapiece, although later estimates
(04:52):
put them at over 6,000.
Captain Bigelow, the architectand engineer who originally
designed the mill, reasonedsince it was safe enough when
the machines were put in, thenthem moving them should cause no
harm to the building, becauseyou know, physics were different
in the 19th century and youdidn't have to worry about
(05:14):
things like oh I don't know,proper weight distribution.
Just stack it all up in onecorner, it'll be fine.
All this moving around made afew of the people on the third
floor a bit nervous, to say theleast.
All the banging and poundinggoing on during the move caused
(05:34):
the whole building to shake andrattle.
As 4.30 approached, the lightcoming in from the large windows
was growing dim.
Asa crew of men went aboutlighting the gas lamps
throughout the mill so theycould keep working on into the
evening.
They didn't get very far.
Less than five minutes after themen on the fourth floor quit
(05:55):
moving equipment, at roughly4.47, a crash was heard on the
fourth floor, followed by alouder explosion as the mill
began falling in on itself, onefloor falling down on the next
and the next.
A wall dropped into thecourtyard as dust was launched
into the air and less than aminute the Pemberton Mill had
(06:17):
fallen.
The sound was heard acrossLawrence, followed by the
screaming.
The dust was mistaken for smokeand the fire department was
quickly on the way, as well asmost of the townsfolk, to see
what happened.
Everyone was drawn in by thestrange noise of the collapse.
The first on scene werehorrified at the sight.
They expected a fire and foundnothing but rubble, rubble and
(06:42):
the screams of the hundreds ofworkers trapped beneath it.
Witnesses across the streetwould later describe the
building as swaying before thecollapse started on the south
end of the fourth floor, wherethe building began to fall in on
itself.
The floors dropped one by one,nearly unbroken, on top of the
(07:02):
next one down.
Mill workers lived and died bywhere they stood.
As the mill collapsed, sometried to jump out nearby windows
.
Others took refuge under nearbylooms and machinery.
The arches of the looms heldback the weight of the falling
timbers and machinery, creatinga safe haven for those lucky
enough to be close by.
(07:24):
Some of those who remainedunharmed or lightly injured
managed to dig their way out ofthe rubble.
Others would remain trappeduntil help could arrive, and it
wouldn't take long for that helpto come.
Over the next few hours, over2,000 people turned up to help
in the rescue, and their taskwas daunting.
They had to clear out heavymachinery, large timbers and
(07:48):
sections of brickwork andmountains of rubble to dig
through.
While they had tons of help,they had no leadership.
They were disorganized andgoing about it all willy-nilly,
making the effort not nearly aseffective as it could have been.
By 5.30 pm the darkness wasgrowing, so bonfires were lit
around the buildings so therescuers could see what they
(08:11):
were doing and continue workingthroughout the night.
They worked all through thenight clearing rubble, tearing
apart equipment to rescuesurvivors, removing the wounded
and the dead from the rubble.
They used ropes and pulleys tomove wreckage aside.
Food and coffee was lowered totrap survivors to help them make
it through the night.
(08:31):
Six hours after the collapse,the hundreds of volunteers were
working their way slowly throughthe debris.
With time and effort a body,living or dead, was pulled out
and sent to City Hall.
It was dark and they werehaving to work by firelight or
by the light of lanterns.
Mr Saunders, the mayor, madesure that kerosene oil lanterns
(08:55):
were swapped out for sperm oillanterns, which were less likely
to cause a fire.
It was already something of amiracle that the gas lamps
throughout the mill had notstarted a fire and they did not
want to take any more chances inan area covered in highly
flammable material, from the drycotton to the machines that had
(09:15):
leaked oil all over them.
They had spread and covered thefallen timbers.
Even with their precautions, theinevitable happened A lantern
being lowered through the rubbleto attract a group of survivors
fell and broke.
The flame from the brokenlantern quickly jumped the
(09:38):
nearby cotton and from fromthere it was unstoppable,
jumping from scraps of cotton tothe pools of spilled oil on the
floor, to the dry timbers inthe wreckage.
The fire raced through therubble.
The once safe spaces, all thenooks and crannies people hid in
to escape the collapse, becameflues for the fire, letting in
(10:00):
air and pushing the fire forward.
Rescuers were pushed back bythe blazing wall of flames.
Survivors, just feet fromrescue, were lost to the flames.
As fire burnt through the rubble, firefighters already on hand
abandoned the dig and raced toretrieve their equipment where
they had left it.
Soon streams of water fromvarious hydrants poured onto the
(10:24):
fallen mill, to little effect.
The rubble worked against theirefforts.
The way the floors fell andlaid at odd angles redirected
most of the water away from theflames.
More streams of water startedpouring in, but the fire raged
unchecked, spreading further andfurther through the debris.
(10:45):
More rescuers were driven backby the flames, forced to abandon
the trapped survivors below.
By midnight a second wall hadfallen the west wall of the main
mill, the northern half thatran from the bathroom tower to
join with the wing jutting tothe west.
This wall carried tons ofbricks onto the Blue House and
(11:06):
the freight cars on the railroadsiding nearest to the
Washington Mills.
The bathroom remained standinguntil later that Wednesday.
The force of the falling wallwas so strong it crushed several
rail cars that had broughtcotton to the mill.
In a short time they wouldcatch fire and eventually be
destroyed.
(11:27):
By 1230, the last livingsurvivors were pulled from the
wreckage.
City Hall was turned into both atemporary hospital and a morgue
.
The severely injured andunrecognizable dead were brought
into different rooms of thecity hall.
One corner of the great roomwas dubbed the dead room and
(11:47):
quickly filled with the brokenand mangled corpses pulled out
of the wreck.
More than 50 doctors fromLawrence and the surrounding
communities were on hand to helpwith what they knew would be a
growing number of casualties.
Women from the area stepped upto help tend to the injured and
dying.
The main hall was turned into ahospital.
(12:08):
Donated mattresses, blanketsand sheets were placed in rows
along three of the walls and by1230 Wednesday morning more than
50 wounded were put there.
Other local gifts arrived fromnearby druggists and homeowners,
including bandages, cordialsand medicines.
Within hours, other donatedgoods were coming in from all
(12:32):
over the region.
The owners of the steamerMinimon Sanford sent 125 sheets
and a supply of lint.
And if you're thinking dryerlint, like I was, well, you're
not too far off.
Lint in 1860 was a soft, fuzzymaterial used as an absorbent
(12:53):
padding, mostly used in treatingwounds.
Cops guarded the door of thetemporary hospital as the crowds
outside got bigger and bigger.
Spectators were coming in bythe train loads.
Wednesday saw over 4,000 comefrom nearby Lowell alone, and
more would continue to pour inover the next few days.
(13:13):
The city of Lawrence would be agiant mass of humanity by the
week's end.
Everyone wanted to help out orsee the site of the disaster.
It's like a train wreck.
Who can resist looking?
When the streets and sidewalkswere filled, people stood in the
ice-covered canal to watch thesmoke still pouring from the
mill.
(13:38):
By Wednesday afternoon, theextent of the damages were being
made clear.
Still standing were the riverbuilding, repair shed and cotton
house.
The river building, also knownas the picker and die house, had
undamaged turbines within it.
2,000 bales of cotton valued at$100,000, had been untouched in
(13:59):
the cotton house.
$100,000 had been untouched inthe cotton house, which would
help make up for at least someof the companies lost when B&M
freight cars loaded withundelivered cotton were
destroyed by fire.
And of course there was morebad news, though.
Fire had destroyed many of theadministrative and archival
records.
When the building collapsed, thepaymaster and clerk had been
(14:21):
working on the December payroll.
Clerk Henry Newhall had leftthe envelopes and list of
employees in his desk.
As he fled the building, theonly thing left was to hope this
sturdy company safe, whichwould hopefully be recovered,
would contain an old payroll.
The newest intact list ofemployees anyone could remember
(14:43):
existing was over five monthsold, dating all the way back to
August 1859.
While not great and far frombeing accurate enough to date,
it would at least make a goodstarting point for a new payroll
to pay out what employees hadbeen owed.
By now Pemberton managers hadtaken control of the site,
(15:05):
derricks were brought in to liftheavy machinery Poor Derrick.
Anyways, a hundred men werehauling rubbish away.
The growing crowd stood out ina second night watching the few
volunteers fresh to the effortsas they slowly lifted charred
material in their grim search.
Thursday, dr Lamb, the countycoroner, called together jurors
(15:27):
to start an inquest into whatcaused the mill to collapse.
Outside, the rain had turned tosnow as firefighters still
poured water down into the massof rubble, and what was now
largely a massive cleanupoperation continued to clear out
the wreckage.
The company's safe was foundand opened that afternoon.
(15:47):
They found some paperwork topoint them in the right
direction for compiling a newpayroll, but it was way far from
complete.
The biggest find in the safe,though, was the original
architectural plans for the mill, which were quickly turned over
to the coroner's inquest.
Neighboring mills were forcedto shut down as either workers
(16:09):
refused to return to work fromfear of another mill collapse or
shut down completely.
After incidents which led topeople fleeing in fear of a
collapse, people that had beenreported as missing came forward
to let the mayor know they wereokay and be removed from the
missing list.
A mass funeral was held for thebodies and partial remains of
(16:31):
nine unidentified dead, who wereplaced into two boxes and the
receiving tombs of the citycemetery.
The city would be filled withthe shrieks and cries of
mourning for days.
By Saturday some semblance ofnormalcy had returned.
All but one mill had reopened.
A road had been cleared throughthe rubble to allow travel
(16:53):
through the area.
The fire was contained, exceptfor burning embers deep within
that would flare up with intenseheat when exposed to the air
With an increase in theworkforce.
13 more bodies were found in therubble.
Only six would be identifiedimmediately.
Black dust from the badlycharred bodies covered
(17:14):
everything.
The dead room floor was pitchblack from all the ash Churches
and cemetery workers preparedfor the coming onslaught of
funerals.
Coffin makers worked tirelesslyto meet the demands for coffins
and boxes for unidentifiedremains.
Most of the crowds started tothin out as onlookers returned
(17:35):
home and families came forth toclaim their dead and wounded.
And families came forth toclaim their dead and wounded.
As night fell, a call to ceasethe dig was made.
They were afraid if they keptgoing in the dark bodies would
be unnecessarily mutilated inthe attempt to retrieve them in
the dark.
(17:56):
Sunday, most of the churches intown were filled.
Side altars were filled withcandles covered in black in
memoriam of the victims.
The ruins had cooledsufficiently by Sunday afternoon
and workers were able to scourthe main building and pulled out
three more bodies from therubble.
On Monday, the man in charge ofclearing the wreckage, th
(18:19):
Dolliver, claimed no more bodieswere to be found and that
prediction wouldn't last long.
At 8 pm, workers removingdebris at the Blue House came
upon one of the final bodies tobe found.
The days following the collapse,newspapers around the nation
ran sensationalized headlinesproclaiming hundreds dead in the
(18:41):
fire.
As they raced to sell morepapers than their competitors,
the 19th century version ofclickbait sold a lot of papers.
Lawrence was still counting andtrying to identify the wounded
and dead, so nobody had afucking clue how many people
were actually dead.
They were just making shit up,which sounds about right.
By 6 pm Wednesday night, thecount was up to 50 dead and
(19:04):
counting.
A group was sent out to canvasthe city and take up a census.
By Sunday the count was up to117 dead, 89 missing and 119
seriously injured.
Financial support was pouringinto Lawrence.
Boston kicked it off by sending$2,000 on Wednesday and another
(19:26):
$3,000 the following day.
That first Sunday after thecollapse, the city.
Clergy's fun drive for the poor, originally meant for something
else, was redirected toPemberton Mills victims.
Grace Episcopal Church aloneraised a thousand dollars.
Tons of gifts were beingarranged by categories and
(19:48):
distributed from City Hall.
Two weeks after the fall of themill a newspaper recorded the
day's count as hundreds ofoutside garments, undergarments,
articles of bedding and bottlesof liniment.
Former employees and survivingrelatives and friends were
informed early in the week thatmanagement had compiled a final
(20:10):
payroll and set up adistribution schedule.
Wages would be given to cover38 workdays from December 1st to
January 10th.
This would be paid out over athree-day period in town.
After digging through availablerecords and reports, based on
what the people canvassing thetown came up with 930 pay
(20:32):
envelopes were prepared.
At 9 30 am on WednesdayPaymaster Clark faced the line
of former employees and ofcourse there had to be at least
one person trying to profit offthe death of another.
The company notice had said themoney due to those who were
(20:54):
killed would be paid to therelatives.
So a woman showed up andclaimed to be Ellen Roach.
Ellen had at first beenreported killed but was then
claimed to be found among theuninjured because a relative who
came for the sum due.
Ellen, upon the payroll of themill, called herself by her name
and was supposed to be the sameperson.
(21:16):
Ellen had been buried inDorchester, massachusetts, and
her next of kin had been given$75 as a death benefit.
There's no record of punishmentfor the woman, nor what
happened to the $10.93 that wasstolen.
So, basically, this womanclaimed to be somebody she
wasn't and made off with 11bucks.
(21:37):
A total of just over $22,000 inpayroll had been paid out over
the three days.
As a coroner of Essex Countysince 1854, william Lamb had
wasted no time in ordering aninquest into the deaths at the
mill.
He convened a jury on Thursday,january 12th, less than 40
(21:57):
hours after the building'scollapse.
At a time when women were notpermitted to provide civic
services, the jury appearedotherwise to generally represent
the community.
Five of the jurors worked inthe building trades, most likely
recruited for the jury due totheir expertise and knowledge.
The foreman, william Wright,who was the service chief
(22:20):
interrogator of witnesses, wasan attorney and an up-and-comer
in Massachusetts North Shorepolitics.
The inquest clerk was CalebSaunders, the mayor's brother.
The younger Saunders maintaineda transcript of the hearing,
which was supposed to be over 40pages long.
However, the only survivingrecord of the hearing comes from
(22:42):
the newspapers.
By the end of the inquest,charles H Bigelow, the architect
and engineer behind thebuilding, was found at fault due
to insufficient testing anddefects in the hollow cast iron
pillars supporting the mill'sfloor.
There was also some concernsover only using two rows of
(23:03):
pillars and not three, alongwith substandard mortar and
supports being used on the wallsof the mill.
The verdict concluded thatthese failures, along with
insufficient testing and designflaws, led to the collapse, and
also that the foundry manager,albert Fuller, was also to blame
(23:23):
for the faulty cast ironpillars.
The jury's findings have beencriticized in the following
years for not explaining why afaulty pillar broke in and, in
domino fashion, all 270 castiron columns went down, taking
with them the mammoth buildingthey helped hold upright.
(23:43):
The reasoning generally heldthat the factory had stood more
than six years without failing,poorly, cast columns or not.
Several investigations haveincluded the possibility that an
unexplained event created acondition that set off the
(24:05):
collapse of the Pemberton'sweight-bearing pillars.
Machine breakage and vibrationhave been suggested, but what
caused the fall is as much amystery today as it was back in
1860.
Now I have a little bit of anissue with this.
They know from eyewitnessaccounts.
The collapse started on thefourth floor, the same floor
(24:28):
they were moving heavy machineryabout without much of a care as
the proper weight distribution.
Hell, they couldn't even reacha general consensus on the right
weight of some of the machines.
It seems pretty obvious to mynon-engineering brain that they
overloaded one of the pillarssupporting the fourth floor.
When that pillar collapsed, itwould have caused a domino
(24:51):
effect spreading out in threedirections Going upwards, the
loss of the fourth floor wouldhave meant the fifth and sixth
floor were no longer supported,so those sections of the
flooring would have started todrop.
Going outwards along the fourthfloor, the loss of one pillar
would have put a greater strainon the other pillars supporting
(25:14):
the floor.
That would now have sections ofthe fifth and sixth floor
coming down on it and addingmore weight to the pillars,
causing them to collapse.
And finally going downwards,when the first part of the
fourth floor fell, its weightwould have slammed down on the
third floor, causing the pillarsto collapse and dominoing from
(25:36):
there as the defective pillarswere being tasked with
supporting more and more weightuntil they inevitably failed and
the entire building fell.
But that's just myinterpretation, but what the
fuck do I know?
There would be no criminalcharges filed and no one would
end up being held accountablefor all the deaths and injuries
(25:58):
caused in the collapse.
For all the deaths and injuriescaused in the collapse.
The original mill would neverbe reopened and officially
closed down in March, after theowners sold off everything they
could.
Within a year of the collapse,nevins bought out Howe and had a
new mill constructed on top ofthe original foundation, a mill
that is still standing over 100years later.
(26:20):
While some lawmakers would tryto pass legislation to push for
better safety standards, nothingwould ever come of it.
It would take more deaths andmore disasters going into the
early 20th century before lawsregarding worker safety and
better working conditions wouldbe passed.
Safety and better workingconditions would be passed, and
(26:44):
that was the fall of thePemberton Mill.
Thanks for listening and if youliked the show, please consider
leaving a rating or review onyour app of choice and reach out
to the show athistoriesanddisaster at gmailcom
with questions, comments orsuggestions, as well as
following the show on socialmedia like Facebook or Instagram
(27:06):
and a few others TikTok,youtube, whatever and share the
episode.
Your friends will love it.
Take care of yourself out there, chase that dream.
Live for today, becausetomorrow is never guaranteed.
Thanks and goodbye.
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