Life
With his wife Kate O’Leary, owner of cow who allegedly knocked over
the lamp that started the Chicago Great Fire of 1871, destroying 200 acres
of buildings at a cost of 200-300 lives, leaving 94,000 homless with nearly
16,000 buildings in ruins, at damges of perhapa 3000 million dollars;
himself lost six coews, barn, wagons, and a horse; testified that he wouldn’t
blame any man in America for hanging him if he had been responsible; a
son (a gambler called Big Jim) claimed later that the fire had been started
by local tramps smoking near the barn.
Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)