Mercy Hospital St Elizabeth Ward Fire Davenport Iowa, 1950
The Saint Elizabeth Ward was a three story brick building used to house and treat mental health patients at Davenport, Iowa’s Mercy Hospital in 1950. The hospital and ward were operated by the Sisters of Mercy. There were 65 women and 3 men in the ward when it burned on January 7, 1950, and though the building was of brick it contained a great deal of wooden framing and other flammable materials, and the flames spread quickly. Because the building housed facilities for treating the mentally ill many of the windows were barred, minimizing potential escape routes, and creating barriers for rescuers.
The majority of the women patients were elderly, and many suffered from other infirmities in addition to the mental health issues which led to them being in the ward. When the fire broke out all three of the men patients managed to escape, two of them from jumping through an upper story window which was unbarred. More than 100 firemen arrived to fight the fire and rescue those trapped within the building, but the amount of fuel for the fire which also produced toxic smoke and gases rapidly overcame many of the patients. Firemen trying to enter the building through barred windows did so from ladders which were threatened by flames from the floor below.
The heat from the fire was so intense that iron bed frames melted and were carried out afterwards as unrecognizable twisted metal. Many of the patients opened the windows of their rooms in an attempt to get fresh air, providing fresh oxygen which fed the intensity of the fire. By the time the firefighters brought the blaze under control after more than four hours, 31 were known dead, and another 31 had been treated in other areas of Mercy hospital for burns or other injuries. It was believed that the other six bodies were buried in the ruins of the building.
It was at first believed that careless smoking started the blaze in a room on the second floor, which spread unnoticed due to the lateness of the hour (the fire was first spotted at about 2 AM). Later it was learned that a patient deliberately used a cigarette lighter to set fire to the curtains in her room, and the fire quickly spread through the use of combustible ceiling tiles throughout the building.
The eventual death toll from the Saint Elizabeth Ward fire was 41, as four of the injured succumbed to their injuries, all of them women, and all of them patients on the ward at the time of the fire but one. The sole exception was a nurse who escorted one patient out of the building and returned to help more before the firemen arrived to prevent such behavior. The year before the fire the hospital had received a suggestion that a sprinkler system be installed, but had taken no action.