house on the
east side of Van Ness Avenue between Washington and Bush streets, and by
3:30 nearly every one was on fire. Their method was this: A soldier
would, with a vessel like a fruit-dish in his hand, containing some
inflammable stuff, enter the house, climb to the second floor, go to the
front window, open it, pull down the shade and curtain, and set fire to
the contents of his dish. In a short time the shades and curtain would
be in a blaze. When the fire started slowly, they would throw bricks and
stones up to the windows and break the glass to give it draught. It took
about 20 minutes for a building to get well on fire. From 4 to 4:30 St.
Luke's and the Presbyterian Church and all the houses on Van Ness Avenue
from Bush to Washington were on fire. At about this time they began
dynamiting. Then they started backfiring, and, as the line, of fire was
at Polk Street, the idea was to meet the flames and not allow them to
cross Van Ness Avenue. This was a great mistake, as it caused the whole
of the blocks between those streets to be on fire at once, which made an
intense heat, while if allowed to approach Van Ness from Polk Street the
heat would have been much less, and would not have ignited the west side
of Van Ness. The explosions of dynamite were felt fearfully in my house;
those within two blocks would jar and shake the house violently,
breaking the windows, and at the same time setting off the burglar
alarm. As the windows would break it tore the shades and curtains,
covered the floor with glass, and cracked the walls. After it was over I
found that it had demolished in my house twelve plates and fifty-four
sheets of glass, each measuring about thirty by fifty inches.

At 4:45 1 was ordered out of my house by the soldiers,--not in a quiet
manner, but with an order that there was no mistaking its terms and
meaning,--about like this: "Get out of this house!" I replied: "But
this is my house and I have a right to stay here if I choose." "Get out
d--n quick, and make no talk about it, either!" So a soldier with a
bayonet on his gun marched me up Clay Street to Gough amid flames,
smoke, and explosions. Feeling exhausted from climbing the steep street,
and when within one hundred feet of Gough Street I rested on a doorstep.
I had not been there for more than two minutes before a soldier on the
opposite side of the street leveled his gun and cried out, "Get out of
that old man, and go up on to Gough Street." As he ha