CHAPTER SIXTEEN

A Mad Crowd

The people of London went crazy on Monday morning. Everyone tried to escape to the North or the East, on their feet, by boat, or by train. It was only a matter of hours before the police and railways were made helpless. Everywhere, people were fighting each other for a place on an escaping train or boat. In the streets, police had become so angry about the surrounding craziness that they started beating the people they had been ordered to help.

By noon, the black clouds had floated into several areas of the city. My brother, meanwhile, had been lucky enough to be one of the first to arrive at a bicycle store. He rode his way through the crowd of people outside of the shop and made his way toward Edgware. Almost three quarters of the way there, his bicycle's front tire went flat, making the bike almost completely impossible to ride. He managed to walk the rest of the way. When he finally arrived at the little village, he saw the residents there standing outside their doors, watching in disbelief as more and more people from London arrived.

After getting a bite to eat at a local hotel, my brother decided to head toward the town of Chelmsford where some friends of his lived. He took a path to the northeast and walked for several miles without seeing anyone. However, as he was walking near High Barnet, he began to hear the sound of women screaming.

He immediately ran to where the screams were coming from and found three men trying to steal a horse and wagon from two women. Two of the men were holding the women, while the third man was attempting to lead the horse away. My brother, being an excellent fighter, ran at one of the men and hit him in the face. The man let go of the woman he was holding and tried to come back at my brother, however, he had no time, for my brother beat him down to the ground. My brother then turned and grabbed hold of the other woman's attacker. She too was let go. However, before my brother could take care of him, the third man hit him square in the face. The second man then managed to escape from my brother's hold. It was now two against one.

The two women got into their wagon and started driving quickly away. My brother, seeing that he was now in trouble, started to run after them. Behind him, the two remaining men also came running as well. The wagon was moving much too fast for my brother to catch and his vision was still a little unclear from the blow he had just received to his face. The two men were just about to catch up to him, when, luckily, one of the women stopped the wagon and jumped back down to the ground with a gun in her hand. She fired once, just barely missing my brother, and frightened the two thieves into running away.

The woman walked my brother back to her wagon and helped him into it. The three of them then drove on, not knowing exactly where they were going. My brother learned that they were the wife and sisters of a doctor in the town of Stanmore, who, after hearing about the coming Martians, put them in the wagon, gave them his gun, and told them to ride to Edgware and catch a train. He was supposed to meet them that morning in Edgware, but he never arrived. The two women, seeing the growing crowds in town, decided to forget the train and started off in the direction that my brother found them.

My brother agreed to stay with them until they were safe and tried to comfort them by saying that he was excellent with a gun, which was not at all true. They welcomed his company and appreciated the help he had given them with the three thieves they had unexpectedly encountered.

The women suggested catching a train at St. Albans, but my brother disagreed due to the dangerous crowds that were killing one another in order to escape. My brother thought it would be better to try and leave the country entirely, by going toward Essex. After some arguing with the doctor's wife, Mrs Elphinstone, the three finally agreed to follow my brother's plan and drove on toward Barnet.

Along the way, as they came closer to the town, they began to see more people about. One man seemed totally out of his mind, talking to himself and swinging his fists about wildly to fight off Martians that were not there. Then they passed a wagon carrying three pitiful, young factory girls. Their faces were dirty from either the job or their escape, it was hard to know.

Barnet was on fire when they arrived, and as they came to the main road that passed through the town from London, they found a huge crowd of people, all pushing one another in an attempt to escape to the north. This road crossed the path my brother and his newfound partners were trying to follow. Mrs Elphinstone became quite frightened by the destruction of the town and the sight of all the escaping people. Everyone looked weak and terrified. Many were crying as they passed them on the road. When my brother turned around to look back toward London, he saw a sea of people without end. It was unbelievable.

The crowd was a very cruel and dangerous one. People who had horses and carriages, at every opportunity, tried to force their way through the people in front of them. Men and women were pushed to the ground in painful cries.

"Get out of the way!" they would shout, "Hurry up! The Martians will soon be here!"

The people and the horses all looked hungry and thirsty. It seemed, at any moment, they might drop to the ground from weakness; however, fear pushed them forward, every single one of them. And there were people of all sorts in this crowd: injured soldiers, barely able to walk; workers, some helpful while others mean and thoughtless; old women with crying young children; kind and cruel people alike, all thrown together in this endless stream of bodies.

At one point, my brother, having passed a little girl crying out for her mother, went and picked her up and brought her back to the wagon. Then a cry came from somewhere in the crowd: "Ellen! Ellen!" and the little girl stood up at once and jumped from the wagon and into the arms of a crying young woman.

Then something terrible happened. The bag of a man walking behind my brother suddenly broke open and all kinds of coins fell to the ground. The man stopped, frightened of losing his money and was struck on the head from behind by the board of a wagon. He fell to the ground and was pushed out of the way by a couple of men. A moment later the man ran back into the crowd and jumped upon the money, trying to collect as much of it in his pockets as he could. Then someone yelled, "Move! Out of the way!" and a large carriage came upon the man there. My brother yelled for the carriage to stop, but, of course, it did not. Seconds later, the man's back was crushed under one of the carriage wheels.

My brother, with the help of another carriage-driver, moved the poor victim out of the way of the crowd. As they were carrying him, the injured man yelled horrible insults at my brother and tried to free himself in order to get back to his money. Then, the carriage of the man who was helping my brother was struck from behind by another, impatient wagon. This frightened the horse pulling the front carriage and made it begin to rise up on its back feet. As my brother looked up and prepared to move out of the way of the wild horse, the man with the money bit my brother's hand, causing my brother to drop him. My brother, having no other choice, rolled out of the way of the approaching danger, while the man who bit him fell under the stomping feet of the horse and the wheels of the carriage it pulled. Cries of terror passed through the crowd as the man was trampled to death.

My brother then returned to the two women and suggested that they turn around, for it seemed hopeless to try and cross the road through this desperate gathering of people. After going only one hundred yards back in the direction they had just come, my brother realized the importance of keeping his original plan. It was really their only hope for staying alive.

So, once again, they turned back toward the crowd and fought their way through all the people to the other side of the road, my brother bravely stopping traffic on his feet, while the doctor's sister attempted to drive the carriage past the angry line of people. The man whose carriage my brother prevented from moving began to strike him with his whip, while his carriage crashed into the side of their wagon, pushing it sideways. My brother jumped back onto the wagon and told the doctor's sister to aim her gun at the man's horse.

"If he pushes us any further, shoot," he said.

Eventually, they made it through, but not before being pushed almost a full mile north. They then continued their journey eastward. They drove on late into the evening until hunger and sleepiness finally caught up with them, forcing them to stop and rest somewhere along the roadside.

(end of section)