Thank you to the Pierre Volunteer Fire Department for posting this on their Facebook page. I typed out the letter but couldn’t make out a few words.

First Fire in Village of Pierre

Jan 25th, 1881

At about 2 am a fire was discovered in the Bartlett & Johnsons Blacksmith shop on Missouri avenue between Dakota and Chapelle St. and before anything could be done all the contents were ??? and Johnson who was sleeping in the shop at the time of the fire was rescued after having his hands, feet, and face badly burned and burning all his clothes. The fire is supposed to have originated from pipe of stove in the shop. When discovered the fire had ???? and had enveloped the whole back end of shop behind the tools Mr. Johnson had place a large amount of provisions in the shop for safe keeping.

Copied from the Pierre weekly ???