relief, however, was exceedingly difficult.

There were only a few boats that could be used in the work of rescue
and relief. Ohio National Guardsmen who arrived from Cincinnati Tuesday
night did heroic work. They came in four motor trucks and brought food
and clothing with them. One of the trucks returned to Cincinnati for
more boats.

A relief train arrived from Indianapolis Wednesday morning and other
cars and automobile trucks, loaded with supplies, managed to reach the
outskirts of the city.

The Lakeview Hotel, which had previously housed fifty refugees,
collapsed early Wednesday, but all the occupants left in time to escape
death.

Williamsdale, Cooke, Otto and Overpeck, the north suburbs of Hamilton,
were in ruins. On the west side of the river many residences were saved,
but there was despair among the survivors, who were unable to get word
from husbands and fathers who were caught on the east side and unable to
cross after bridges were destroyed. Efforts to get lines across the
river were futile.

Provisions for the homeless continued arriving in abundance, but the
gas, electric light and water plants were in ruins and this added to the
terrors of the living.

More than two hundred and fifty persons spent two days and nights in the
little court house without light, food, water or heat, and often they
were drenched with rain that leaked through holes in the roof.

REMOVING THE DEAD

As the flood waters receded on March 27th, the authorities immediately
began the work of removing the dead. The first hour of the search saw
ten bodies uncovered from the ruins, and the most conservative estimates
placed the death roll at fifty.

[Illustration: THE FLOOD IN MIAMI VALLEY

The above map shows a part of Ohio which was devastated by the most
disastrous flood in American history. A large number of small streams
converge into larger streams and then into still larger water courses,
several of which form a junction at Dayton, where the greatest loss of
life and the heaviest damage to property occurred.]

Piled high upon the east side of the court house on Friday were coffins
awaiting the flood victims, whose bodies were being gathered as rapidly
as possible.

On April 3d, the city offered a reward of ten dollars for each body
recovered from the debris left by the flood. Up to that time seventy-one
bodies had been recovered. It was believed, however, that many bodies
had been swept out of the Miami into th