Roy Porter takes a deep breath and gives his head a shake before remembering what he’s spent a lifetime wishing he could forget.
“She was there in a window, behind the bars, just screaming ‘help me, help me,’ and then she was gone in the flames. She just … melted,” the 100-year-old Quad Cities man said as he remembered that terrible night Jan. 7, 1950. His words disappear with a shake of his head.
Mr. Porter was the honored guest speaker at the 75th Anniversary Memorial Service for the St. Elizabeth Hospital fire held on Tuesday, Jan. 7. The private event was held in the Reflection Room at MercyOne Genesis Davenport West Medical Center. The St. Elizabeth Hospital was located on a portion of the hospital campus, formerly known as Mercy Hospital.
Forty-one people lost their lives that night, including 40 patients and one nurse who tried to save them. Mr. Porter is the last surviving witness to the horror. He was a 25-year-old second alarmer who responded to the 2:06 a.m. fire call.
“I was with (Fire Chief) Les Schick, who was a friend of mine, on the front porch on the south side and he said ‘Go in with me will you?’” Mr. Porter remembers. “We got into kind of a foyer and all of a sudden there was a roar. Les looked up and said ‘let’s light out of here.’ It was all flames. If we kept going we were going to be the 42nd and the 43rd (victims) in that fire. That’s an awful thing to say.”
Ultimately, 14 fire companies and 107 firefighters would turn out to fight the fire. It is still known as the worst fatal fire in the State of Iowa’s history.
During the MercyOne Genesis memorial, Chuck Doss, the son of firefighter Darrell Doss who was on the scene that night, read the names of the 41 who lost their lives in the fire.
The hospital was administered by the Sisters of Mercy, a Catholic order established in 1868. The 78-year-old St. Elizabeth Hospital building housed 63 mentally ill patients and was considered a model facility for its day.
The bars on the windows were to prevent patients from injuring themselves. There were no fire breaks built in the three-story walls, which would have stopped the fire from climbing up, as it was not required by code and there was flammable fiber board used in the ceiling, which was a common building practice, according to news reports at the time.
Most were sleeping when the fire started on the east side of the building after a curtain was set on fire, according to Bret Grimes. The Bettendorf man, the author of “The St. Elizabeth Hospital Fire in Iowa,” published in late 2023, outlined some of the heroic efforts to save lives that night as part of the observance.
It was 19 degrees that night, and many of the patients who were rescued fought to return to the building to retrieve clothes or shoes. Sisters and chaplains struggled to keep them from re-entering the building while police and firefighters struggled to break the bars barring the windows and entered the building to pull those they found still alive out.
An Associated Press reporter noted “A policeman called for hose lines to drench him with water. Then he disappeared through a window into the smoke and flame. He returned with a woman in his arms.”
The AP report reads like horror noir. “A white-robed nun stood outside the blazing building, weeping bitterly. Her arms held blankets which firemen took to cover bodies as they were removed. Catholic chaplains moved shadow-like about their solemn duties as the flames outlined their figures.”
As MercyOne and Davenport city leaders marked the somber anniversary, Mr. Porter was honored with a plaque given by Fire Chief Mike Carlsten and Police Chief Jeffery Bladel. Mayor Mike Matson proclaimed Jan. 7, 2025, “as Saint Elizabeth Remembrance Day in Davenport… honoring the individuals who lost their lives as well as those affected by the tragic event.”
Mr. Porter is quick to shed praise, deflecting it to current first responders and fire safety.
“That (fire is) why when I come into a building to this day the first thing I do is find an exit. Church, theater, I can’t see an exit, I don’t stay,” he said. “All this stuff. Sprinklers in the ceiling, fire breaks in the walls. Fire exits that you can’t lock. It wasn’t there back then.”
He is glad the tragedy is being remembered. He also was happy to help Mr. Grimes with this book, happy to be a part of the memorial Tuesday.
“It’s important,” he says. “Vital, to remember this history. I’m glad to be a part of it.”
He’ll never forget it. Even if he wanted to.
