The fire

Fire Kills Everyone Inside Rosewood Prison

The prison burned through the night. Nobody inside survived.

By the Rebel News county desk. Rosewood, Monday 4 April 1994. 1 min read.

Night, seen from high in the air: a big state prison in dark woods, its four long cell blocks burning from end to end with their roofs fallen in, one guard tower alight like a torch and black smoke lit orange rolling across the sky, all of it inside an unbroken ring of fence and razor wire glowing in the firelight, an empty road running off into the dark and a small town's lights far away in the corner. — From up here it almost looks pretty. Rebel News picture desk

ROSEWOOD. You smell a prison fire long before you see it. Wet concrete, cheap mattresses, floor polish, and underneath it something you'd rather not put a name to. Rosewood woke up to that smell this morning, with ash coming down on the fence like snow in April.

The prison burned all night. By sunrise the place that held the county's worst was a black shell breathing smoke out of every window, and the only thing still standing straight was the fence. Nobody came out of it.

Inside

The prison's own dead were in there, still shuffling round in their orange, along with whoever the court had under lock that week. The Recorder isn't giving out names, and a locked cell never cared much about names anyway.

The match

Nobody knows who lit it. The gate was chained, the cells were shut, and the Recorder can't open a case without someone to accuse. Whoever did it took their time.

The treeline

Take this for what it's worth. A survivor on the Rosewood fence, up late watching the towers go, swears there was someone on the hill at the edge of the woods. No hurry in them. A duffel over one shoulder, and they never once looked back.

Night, from a wet grassy hill: a big prison complex burns from end to end behind its fence, flames pouring from every cell-block window and both guard towers, black smoke lit orange above it, the glow reflected in a puddle in the foreground; far down in the lower right corner, almost lost in the dark, one small figure walks away into the trees with a bag over one shoulder. — Took us ten minutes to find. Can't unsee it now. Rebel News picture desk

Get up on that hill while it's still smoking. Stand in the wet grass, breathe it in, and then look at the treeline.

Look properly.