Monroe Survivors of the 1900 Galveston Hurricane

A couple of weeks ago, I stumbled across this little paragraph in the New Orleans Times-Picayune, September 23, 1900, Page 15:

Mrs. Ernest Fudicker and her two boys, who survived the Galveston storm, reached home on Saturday, to the joy of many friends. She says the Beach hotel, where she was stopping, was swept into the gulf ten minutes after she left it, and that the Atlanta, to which she fled, rocked and creaked and groaned all during the storm, threatening to collapse with every buffet, but stood the strain, though unroofed.

Mrs. Fudickar would be Louise Brueckner Fudickar. She was married to Ernest, Sr. At the time of the hurricane, she would have four living sons (one daughter had died in 1884). The boys and their ages at the time, would have been : Ernest Jr. (17), Willie (15), Paul (13) and Fred (11). The Shreveport Caucasian of September 14, 1900, Page 4 states the boys ages as ten and twelve, so she probably had Paul and Fred with her. The Shreveport Journal, September 12, 1900, Page 5 states Ernest Sr. had been trying to get in touch with the family but hadn’t been successful. In those days, communication relied on telegraph wires and all of them were down. I can’t imagine the terror of not knowing what had happened to your family! The Shreveport Caucasian had a short interview with Louise and she stated she and the boys floated in the water until they were rescued. She said the stench was horrific and five blocks of buildings were gone.

If you have never heard of the Galveston Hurricane, I highly recommend reading “Isaac’s Storm” by Erik Larson. The library has two copies in the system you can check out. It is an excellent minute by minute account of that hurricane. The hurricane was one of the deadliest on record, killing between 6,000 and 12,000. You can get an overview here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1900_Galveston_hurricane .

New Orleans Times-Democrat, September 11, 1900, Page 7.