Despite the horror and confusion on that September morning, staff members tried to help each other cope during the intense moments of stress. Cris Comerford formed an impromptu prayer group at Farragut Square. She said, “Okay. Let me just give these people a word of encouragement and do whatever I can do in my own little way and help to make this an easier time for them, even though I don’t know the answers and I don’t have the answer. And we kind of like huddled and prayed.” As much as possible, the Residence staff stood together and accounted for each other, often moving as a group to safe locations where they found food, bathrooms, televisions, and landline phones. Having a hospitality background, Christine Limerick encouraged the staff to congregate at the Capital Hilton Hotel, at the corner of Sixteenth
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and K Streets NW, where there were televisions, food, phones, and bathrooms. She purchased Tylenol and Advil at the hotel, knowing many people would probably have headaches. Those gathered at the Hilton included chefs, housekeepers, a butler, and Storeroom Chief Bill Hamilton. Hamilton offered to walk to his church, at Twenty-Seventh and Dumbarton Streets NW, to borrow his church’s van to take everyone home. Once he got the van, what would normally be a ten-block drive back to the hotel turned out to be thirty to forty blocks, due to road closures. Those at the hotel walked to Sixteenth and R Streets NW to meet him at a corner. Hamilton transported Cris Comerford to Wheaton, Maryland, and Housekeeper Sylvia DaSilva and Rachel Walker to their homes in Northeast and Northwest Washington. Walker recalled
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Storeroom Chief Bill Hamilton gathered at the Capital Hilton with colleagues before walking to Georgetown to borrow his church’s van in order to drive everyone home. Making long detours to navigate closed roads, he insisted on driving even those who offered to walk to their homes. Rachel Walker recalled Hamilton’s kindness. “He wanted us all to stay together as a group and get everybody to where they needed to go safely. . . . Everybody from the Residence was so thoughtful that day . . . I didn’t see anybody panic.”