# John Tolland
# Testimony before the Board of Police and Fire Commissioners, session of Tuesday 28 Nov. 1871 (day 5), as reported in the Chicago Tribune of 1871-11-29, page 4
# Source: Library of Congress, Chronicling America (lccn sn82014064): https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn82014064/1871-11-29/ed-1/?sp=4 ; OCR text https://tile.loc.gov/text-services/word-coordinates-service?segment=/service/ndnp/dlc/batch_dlc_clark_ver03/data/sn82014064/no_reel/1871112901/0004.xml&format=alto_xml&full_text=1
# Page-OCR lines 854-869; uncorrected OCR; written 2026-09-14T06:28:05Z.
# STATUS: NEWSPAPER REPORT (reported speech with some direct quotation) -- not the stenographic transcript. Bales: Inquiry vol. [2], pp. 184-86.

JOHN LOLLAND,
keeper of tlie crib, said tlio sparks began to fall
upon tbo crib at half-past 11 o’clock on Sunday
nifilit, and continued to fall until 3 o’clock on
Monday morning. Brands from 3 to c indies in
length feU upon the crib, and would
have burned it but for the careful at
tention ho had bestowed upon it
with pails of water. The brands appeared to
be fragments of pine boards, and must have
travelled three miles. Ho could not tell at what
hour the Waterworks were destroyed, but saw
by tho cessation of tho current in tho crib that
the pumps had ceased to act. The smell of the
smouldering city is painfully plain when tho
wind is from the west.