Mitchell and his club gave the machine to the Chinese Museum of Charles Willson Peale. After a few shows it was put into a corner and forgotten. On 5 July 1854, a fire that started at the National Theater in Philadelphia reached the Museum and destroyed the Turk. Mitchell believed he had heard "through the struggling flames ... the last words of our departed friend, the sternly whispered, oft repeated syllables, 'echec! echec!!'