TEAM DROWNED-NARROW ESCAPE - 1868

BURNS, RYAN

Posted By: Cheryl Locher Moonen (email)
Date: 4/21/2016 at 11:23:32

Dubuque Daily Herald – Jan. 1, 1868; Page 4

TEAM DROWNED-NARROW ESCAPE.

Yesterday afternoon Martin Burns lost a valuable span of horses in the river by drowning. He started for Sinsinawa Mound, the wagon containing himself and two sisters, Alderman Ryan and wife and daughter. In attempting to reach the ice, he took the track north of the ferry dock, over which he passed Saturday with a load of hay, but it had been abandoned, owing to a rise in the river to break the ice, making it unsafe. No one preventing him from taking the old traveled course or warning the party of danger, he drove down and proceeded a few feet from the shore when the horses and wagon plunged through the ice. Mr. Ryan jumped from the wagon and saved the females, who were not rescued without a wetting. The party escaped by a miracle, but despite all efforts, the horses drowned before they could be extricated from the wagon and hauled out. The team was a valuable one, worth $500 dollars. One of the horses was a stallion. The loss is a heavy one for Mr. Burns.