POTTSVILLE - Jeff Kuhlwind was using his computer shortly before midnight Sunday when he heard a scream outside.
"I was sitting at my computer and I heard someone scream, 'Help me. Help me,'" he said.
Kuhlwind looked out his window at 232 Pierce St., Pottsville, and saw nothing but pitch black. Since he didn't see anything, he called 911 at 11:54 p.m. to report the disturbance.
Afterward, Kuhlwind went outside and then saw flames coming from the back of the second floor of 235 Pierce St., and a woman was screaming.
"Help me. The kids are in here. Eric's in here. The kids, we need to get them out," Kelly Brown was yelling, Kuhlwind said.
He called 911 again at 11:56 p.m. and said, "It's a fire. Get the trucks up here now. There's people trapped inside."
Jennifer Purcell, 36, of 226 Pierce St., said Brown was at her house doing laundry when the fire started.
The two smelled smoke and thought it was the clothes dryer, but Purcell looked outside and saw the fire.
"Oh, my God. It's your house," she said to Brown, and both women ran to the house.
Purcell said flames were shooting out of the building and "the back roof was already collapsing."
"She just kept screaming, 'My kids. My kids. My husband. My sister,'" Purcell said.
Kelly Brown went inside the home but a police officer pulled her out, Purcell said. She said Brown is "still in shock."
The late-night Mother's Day fire claimed the lives of Brown's husband, Eric Brown, 30, their four children, Joy Brown, 8; Jeremiah Brown, 7, Emily Brown, 3, and Elijah Brown, 2; and Christina Thomas, 26, Kelly Brown's sister. A dog also died in the fire.
Purcell said that about 11 p.m., an hour before the fire was discovered, her boyfriend, Keith Wykle, went to the Browns' home to light their wood-burning stove, something he has done many times.
She said Wykle lit the stove, then waited until the flames were able to be dampened before leaving the home and going to his mother's house.
"He's done that hundreds of times. He waited until it was running good and left just like all the times before," Purcell said.
Wykle said he hopes the wood-burning stove was not the cause of the fire.
"I hope it wasn't the wood burner. If it was, I'll have to live with that for the rest of my life," he said while standing in front of his home.
Authorities were still searching for the cause of the fire Monday.
Wykle said he has a similar heating unit in his own home and is confident that the burner was functioning properly when he left the Browns' home.
Those around the neighborhood remembered the children Monday.
Children remembered
Theresa Meade, 331 S. Second St., said the two oldest children, Jeremiah and Joy, were often outside playing with other children.
Meade said she left her home at 11:45 p.m. Sunday to pick up her husband at work and didn't notice anything out of the ordinary on the street.
Melissa Maurer, 28, said she knew Jeremiah and Joy. They attended the Headstart program at Child Development in Pottsville about a year and a half ago, and Maurer is an assistant teacher there.
"When I heard there was kids involved, I immediately started praying and hoped they would get out," she said. Later, she found out that she knew the two children.
"I can't even imagine just losing one and she just lost all four of her children on Mother's Day," Maurer said.
She said Jeremiah "always had a smile on his face. Joy was very, like, fashionable. She liked to dress up."
Greg Andregic, a letter carrier who is the union steward of the National Association of Letter Carriers Branch 500, based in Harrisburg, said the house was along his mail route.
"It's been my route for six years," he said. "It's very sad. It's sad to see anybody die like that."
He said he had one piece of mail for the house Monday but would hold it until he is told what to do.
Andregic said that in his job, he gets to know the families on his route. He last spoke with Joy about 7 p.m. Saturday.
"She always says 'Hi' to me," he said.
Tim Firestone, Readiness and Response manager for Red Cross of Schuylkill County, said clothing and food has been given to Brown. She is staying with a cousin in Pottsville, he said, and psychological services are also available.
Stephanie Brown, a relative of the family in Washington state, said a fund in Kelly Brown's name has been opened at Wells Fargo. Any Wells Fargo branch will accept donations to Account No. 2678703436.