Conflagration

My mother Alzada’s earliest and most vivid memory goes back to when she was just 18 months old.

On the record-freezing night of February 2, 1928, she huddled in her mother Susan’s arms in their Durfee Street home, gagging on thick smoke, crying in terror, as the Great Fire of Fall River ravaged the city.

The fire began in the Pocasset Mills and rapidly roared into a widespread inferno. Toxic fumes blanketed the city, and howling winds hampered all efforts.

In just eight hours the conflagration demolished five city blocks, leveled 36 buildings, and most of its businesses, including its five banks, three theatres, three hotels, two newspaper plants, the Post office, and twelve office buildings – all this at a time when the economy was already struggling. 

“I could feel my mother trembling,” Alzada said, recalling how she clung to her mother, while her older brothers, William (age 5) and Frank (age 10) stood close, fearful as they watched the disaster blazing around them.

What a traumatizing moment that must have been for a toddler, to palpably feel the terror of her mother as her whole world was engulfed in smoke and flames. I wonder if this early trauma in part influenced my mother’s intuitively protective nature.

Throughout our lives, all six of us Cross children have always had an inner knowing that we were protected from harm, and I will always be grateful for the safety and comfort she surrounded us with.