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Dec. 21, 1917.
PERSONAL TESTIMONY
Mrs John James 81 Rooma St

Probably 30 years old. Tall, slender. Dark hair, swarthy complexion. Rather illiterate. Dressed in cotton frock which she had on at time of collision, gray woolen and sweater coat. Wedding-ring. Expression dazed even yet. Had been lookin at pictures in a magazine, not reading. Face scarred but not bandaged.

Her husband worked at the Dry Dock. She was putting water on the stove to heat for washing, when the cloud of smoke in the sky attracted her atteneion (?attention). She stood on a chair by the window and looked out. She though "It must be a ship on fire. I hope Jack is all right." Then she stepped off the chair and walked to the kitchen sink. Just as she reached it, the explosion came, and the house was blown to pieces. Says she would surely have been killed had she stayed at the window. She was knocked on her face, buried in the wreckage and quite badly cut about face and head. She screamed for help, but none came. She felt faint, but the cold air revived her a little and she struggled out from the wreckage unaided. She stayed on the roadside and waited for her husband to come. She waited for about two hours, bleeding and cold (she had on only a think cotton frock). The house caught fire - she watched it burn and tried to keep warm by the heat from it. She watched the fire until every vestige of her home was gone - and 'still my husband did not come'. The a soldier came along and took her to Rockhead Hospital. Her wounds were dressed there and later that night she was taken to Cogswell St. Hospital, where she remained until Wednesday December 12,