3-034-761 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Chicago after the Fire: burnt-out people in the chapel of Grace Church, 1871. View of '...the interior of the Grace Church meeting-house, where many of the homeless outcasts found shelter for the night. We learn from the interesting description of Chicago, in the Leisure Hour for June last ("First Impressions of America," by the editor of that magazine), that there were one hundred and seventy churches or chapels in the city at the time of his visit, the leading religious denominations being the Methodist, Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Baptist, Roman Catholic, and Congregational, or Independent, in the order here given; besides five Jewish synagogues, two African or N*gro Methodist Episcopalian, and one Scottish Presbyterian churches. We do not know to which of these bodies "Grace Church" belongs, but it seems to have served a work of Christian charity on the terrible night of the great fire and two following days'. From "Illustrated London News", 1871.