Salix, Iowa Tornado
June
12, 1899
THREE
ARE KILLED.
SALIX, Ia., June 12. -- Three persons
met death in a tornado at 5:30 o'clock last
evening, after having once secured a place of
safety in a cyclone cellar. After
remaining in the refuge a few moments they
fancied the storm had passed and emerged just as
the house above them came tumbling in ruins,
carrying death to three and fatal injuries to a
fourth.
The
dead are:
MALLOY, JOHN,
a farmer
MALLOY, MRS.,
wife of the above
MALLOY, HARRY,
aged 16
Injured:
MALLOY, BESSIE,
aged 18, skull fracture, will die.
MALLOY, THOMAS,
body hurt
MALLOY, PATRICK, severe bruises.
The force of the wind was sufficient to
flatten fences, trees and telegraph wires so
that little news of the surrounding county is
obtainable.
The homes of Phil Berger, Joe Bernard
and
Patrick O'Neil were all reduced to kindling
wood. The occupants, it is reported, all
escaped serious injury.
Pat Malloy, who
was badly injured, tells a graphic story of the
storm. He says houses, barns, live stock
and human beings were sucked up by the terrible
funnel-shaped cloud, the air appearing to be
filled with wrecked buildings and other debris
for over half a mile high.
In the Malloy family there were, besides
those killed and injured, the aged father and
mother of John Malloy and seven sons and one
daughter, who escaped injury. These were
still in the cyclone cellar, but were coming out
when the house fell upon those at the entrance.
The family was at supper when the
funnel-shaped cloud was first seen, and
Dick
Malloy told his parent to go tot he cellar.
He ran to the home of Mrs. Cassell, a widow,
across the road, to warn her and her seven
children. He took them to the cellar and
the house was whirled away, injuring no one.
He had to hold one boy by the legs as he was
being drawn up by the suction of the wind.
But the Malloy family, across the road, only
remained in the cellar about five minutes as the
father suggested that the cloud was only rain.
They came up and in an instant the house was
demolished. The dead and injured members
were scattered among the ruins.
The conductor of a freight train saw the
cloud and stopped his train before it got in the
storm, and when he reached the town he held his
train long enough to take the injured to the
hospital at Sioux City, sixteen miles distant.
Wild rumors are afloat of more damage in
Woodburn county, but cannot be verified.
Fort Wayne News, Fort Wayne, IN, 12 Jun
1899

Another Tornado Victim.
SIOUX CITY, Ia, June 12. -- Another
name was added today to the list of victims of
Sunday's tornado near Salix, Ia.,
Bessie Malloy,
aged nineteen, dying in the hospital here.
It is thought all the rest of the injured will
recover.
The Nebraska State Journal, Lincoln,
NE, 13 Jun 1899

Fifth Victim of the Salix Storm
Another victim of the tornado near Salix.
this state, has been added to the list,
Thomas Malloy
dying at a Sioux City hospital of the shock to
the nervous system. this makes the fifth victim,
all in the Malloy family.
The Chief Reporter, Perry, IA 29 Jun
1899

A terrific windstorm, afterwards called the Salix Cyclone,
struck just south of the town on June 11, 1899, at 5:30 in the afternoon.
A number of homes were blown down and hundreds of head of stock were killed and
crippled. Five out of nine members of the John
Malloy family were killed or fatally injured when the tornado struck
their home on the southeast corner of Salix. The dwellings of
Mrs. Cora Hassell, Philip Burger, and
Joseph Bernard were all within a circle of
300 yards, directly in the path of the twister, and were destroyed.
Richard Malloy rushed Mrs. Hassell and her children to the basement, thus saving
their lives.
The storm, it was estimated, cut a path about four miles
long and 200 yards wide, leaving behind a trail of wrecked houses and barns,
destroying grain and livestock. It blew spokes out of wagon wheels,
plucked chickens of their feathers, and carried a coat out of the Malloy house,
hanging it neatly on a tree. The Malloy
family had just been at supper when one of the sons, Richard, said he smelled
brimstone, and looking out, saw a funnel-shaped cloud in the sky. He
urged the family to go into the cellar, then ran over to warn
Mrs. Hassell. The other Malloys went
below for a few minutes, but thinking the storm was only a cloud burst, started
back upstairs. They were caught n the twister which at that moment struck
and demolished their house. When a searching part located them, Mrs.
Malloy's lifeless body lay on that of her husband. Within a radius of 20
feet were their children - - Tom, Pat, Fred, Harry,
Bessie, and Jack. Harry
died within an hour.
Just before the storm Conductor J.
N. Pollock of the Sioux City and Pacific freight train No. 30, had
stopped on the track a short distance from the Malloy home. When he saw the
injured victims of the storm, he converted a freight car into an ambulance with
the assistance of Richard Malloy and some
neighbors, and then made a fast run to Sioux City. The surviving members
of the family were taken to St. Joseph's Hospital.
Tom and Bessie died, but
fourteen-year-old Pat Malloy, who suffered a
broken collarbone and back injuries, survived. This was the Patrick Malloy
who became Assistant Attorney General of the United States in the spring of
1933. Unfortunately his career was brief. Malloy died in early 1934.
Woodbury County History, Iowa 1942, page 87
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