On the 8th of October, 1871, residents of the town of Peshtigo in Wisconsin noticed a red glow on the
horizon, as well as ashes and sparks blowing in on the breeze. Somewhere nearby a forest
fire was burning – quite possibly a big one. The townsfolk prepared to fight it, filling hogsheads
of water and readying pumps. All of their effort, however, would be in vain. Peshtigo was about
to experience the most destructive forest fire in the history of the United States.
In 1870, Peshtigo was a thriving town in north-eastern Wisconsin. Set alongside the
Peshtigo River in a heavily-wooded region, it was one of the largest and most developed settlements
for miles around. As well as homes for nearly 2,000 residents, there was also a schoolhouse,
two churches, and several factories. The abundant forests which surrounded
Peshtigo were vital to the economy of the town. Trees would be felled, and then floated down
the river to the sawmill, where they would be turned into usable lumber. A woodenware factory
produced everything from furniture to clothes pegs, while a separate factory focussed on
manufacturing wooden doors, windows and blinds. Given that wood was such a readily-available
material, it was used for almost everything in Peshtigo. Nearly every house in the community
was constructed from wood, and surrounded by wooden boardwalks. Most furniture was wooden,
and wooden shavings were even used to stuff mattresses, or to soak up mud in the streets.
Small fires were common in the area. At the time lumberjacks would routinely burn leftover branches
and tree stumps, and farmers would use fire to clear their fields. Sometimes these fires would
burn out of control, resulting in smoke and ash in the air that would force the schoolhouse to shut
and residents to carry lanterns to light their way even in the middle of the day.
This was all regarded as just part of life in Peshtigo – something that,
while it may have caused a great deal of stress to residents – wasn’t thought of as
something anyone could do anything about. Because of this, when a red glow was seen
on the horizon on the 8th of October, 1871, some residents considered it no great cause for alarm.
As the glow deepened, however, and ash and dust began to blow into town on the breeze, a sense of
unease took hold. A group of men fetched a water pump, and set it up ready to draw water from the
river. Hogsheads of water had been set around the town over the course of the previous week, ready
to fight any small fire that might take hold. Soon, though, a roaring sound was heard…
and shortly thereafter flames burst from the treeline and began to consume the town. Some
eyewitness reports from the time indicate that they spread at the speed of a railway locomotive,
driving a wall of embers and ash ahead of them which set fire to anything dry or flammable.
Houses, horses, piles of firewood, clothes and hair all burst into flames.
The men attending to the pump realised instantly that there was no hope of fighting this fire,
and fled. So did everyone else who was able. As the air filled with smoke and
flames set alight everything around them, they sprinted desperately for the river.
One witness – a priest named Peter Pernin – later described the scene:
“The air was no longer fit to breathe, full as it was of sand, dust, ashes, cinders, sparks,
smoke, and fire. It was almost impossible to keep one’s eyes unclosed, to distinguish the road,
or to recognize people, though the way was crowded with pedestrians, as well as vehicles crossing and
crashing against each other in the general flight. Some were hastening towards the river, others from
it, whilst all were struggling alike in the grasp of the hurricane. A thousand discordant
deafening noises rose on the air together. The neighing of horses, falling of chimneys,
crashing of uprooted trees, roaring and whistling of the wind, crackling of fire as it ran with
lightning-like rapidity from house to house – all sounds were there save that of the human voice.
People seemed stricken dumb by terror.” Many people fell before reaching the river,
their hair and clothes ablaze. Those who did make it to the bank plunged into the water,
hoping that there they would be safe from the flames. The river offered a great deal
of protection, but didn’t necessarily guarantee safety. As Father Pernin went on to describe:
“Once in water up to our necks, I thought we would at least be safe from fire, but it was not so;
the flames darted over the river as they did over land, the air was full of them,
or rather the air itself was on fire. Our heads were in continual danger.
It was only by throwing water constantly over them and our faces, and beating the river with our
hands, that we kept the flames at bay. Clothing and quilts had been thrown into the river, to
save them, doubtless, and they were floating all around. I caught at some that came within reach
and covered with them the heads of the persons who were leaning against or clinging to me. These
wraps dried quickly in the furnace-like heat and caught fire whenever we ceased sprinkling them.”
As the hours passed, many succumbed to injuries or exhaustion… or to hypothermia from standing in
the cold, running water of the Peshtigo River. It was only after nearly six hours that the
fires had died down enough for people to emerge. When they did emerge, it was to find Peshtigo all
but completely destroyed. Nothing remained that had not been burned or blackened by smoke – and
this wholesale destruction extended far beyond the town. More than a dozen nearby communities
had been completely destroyed. Residents had taken shelter in the middle of ploughed fields,
or in wells or other bodies of water. In some cases they had miraculously survived,
while in others they had asphyxiated as the fire sucked all oxygen from their refuge.
The fire had cleared whole forests and levelled buildings. The heat had melted metal, and in
some places turned sand to glass. Wildlife and domestic animals had been wiped out.
The fire had burned any source of food, destroyed anything that might be used for
shelter, and in some cases burned the clothing off the bodies of survivors.
The fire had also destroyed telegraph lines, making it impossible for those
in the worst affected areas – like Peshtigo – to communicate just how serious their situation was.
In some cases, news of the fire travelled only as fast as the survivors themselves could travel.
Help was first sent from nearby settlements that had managed to escape complete destruction. Food
and clothing was sent from nearby Marinette. Later on, as news of the disaster did travel, help was
sent from further afield. It so happened that the fire had taken place on the same night as the
Great Chicago Fire, and – when it was understood that many more had died or been injured in
Peshtigo than in Chicago – train cars of emergency supplies were rerouted to the rural community.
In total, the fire claimed the lives of around 1,700 people – though this
number can only ever be approximate, as the flames also destroyed any records that had
been kept in the town. Many hundreds more were injured by flames, heat or smoke inhalation.
It would be some considerable time before the causes of the fire that had consumed Peshtigo
were understood. Other forest fires had burned themselves out, or spread only slowly. Why had
this fire been so swift and so deadly? In part the deadliness of the Peshtigo
fire was a result of weather conditions at the time. An exceptionally dry year
beforehand had created the perfect conditions for flames to spread, and high winds on the
day of the fire had fuelled the flames and rapidly spread embers ahead of the blaze.
Once the fire had attained a certain size it became a firestorm, and began to generate
its own wind. As hot gasses rose in the midst of the fire, air was sucked in from outside,
creating a storm-like turbulence that some survivors compared to a hurricane.
This intense wind helped the fire to spread far faster than the average person could walk or run.
The actual source of the initial spark is unknown. It could have been a campfire,
a hot bullet casing, a lightning strike, a farmer clearing a field, or railway workers laying
tracks. What exactly initiated the blaze mattered little… the weather conditions could have allowed
any fire to build into an unstoppable storm. Though there was little that could have been
done to fight the fire at the time, some lessons were learned from the Peshtigo fire.
During World War Two, the conditions which had lead to the creation of the firestorm which
destroyed Peshtigo were studied extensively… not in order to prevent them from reoccurring,
but in order that they might be replicated by manmade weapons. Firestorms were weaponised
in bombing campaigns throughout the war. Peshtigo was rebuilt… although the forests
around it had been so badly burned that the lumber industry could not re-establish itself there. Over
time the population of the town grew until it had returned to its pre-fire levels. It is now
a thriving city, home to about 3,400 people. It is known by some as “The city rebuilt from ashes”.