Fire of 1874, part two
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In the August 17, 1874 fire that destroyed a number of enterprises of early Matamoras, familiar names in the history of the town suffered many hardships.
The early morning fire started in a saloon on Front Street leased by Mark Albert. The building was located on the river side of the street in the first block north of the intersection with Main. It was completely consumed.
Also completely destroyed was the Biddle Saloon. Its owner, Lloyd Biddle, had already had more than his share of misfortune. He had served in the Union Army, Company C, 77th Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry, beginning in 1861. He had seen his father, Perry Biddle, killed in the Battle of Shiloh. And he himself had been captured and spent the last 10 months of his service in a rebel prison in Tyler, Texas. What he suffered in that prison affected his health the remainder of his life.
The fire also leveled Jacob Grohs' saddlers shop. Grohs, a native of Germany, had opened his shop in 1863, only two years after Matamoras had incorporated.
Mathias Burgbacher, another native of Germany, had his tailor shop in that block. His business was established in 1865, at the close of the Civil War. He had also overseen the construction of his home on a lot adjacent to the tailor shop. To keep the fire from destroying his home, he tore down the tailor shop with his own hands as the fire approached. Immediately after the conflagration, he rebuilt the tailor shop – using brick.
Glassor's Clothing Store and Jonas Unger's boot and shoe shop were destroyed in the fire. Unger also lost his home.
The Masonic Lodge, organized in Matamoras in 1867 by veterans of the Civil War, had its first meeting hall on Front Street. It too, along with all contents, was destroyed.
The Dorsey home and warehouse which stood on the river side of the block were gutted. But a home, built by William Ellis, a prominent bricklayer of the area, and lived in by S.M. Richardson, survived the fire. When this house was razed over 100 years later, some of its beams showed charred evidence of the flames from this fire.
And now I must tell you that next week will be the final edition of the Matamoras Minute.