p. 77 | Untitled article

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Third-day, July 16, 1867

A Violent Tornado.

A CORRESPONDENT of the Cincinnati Gazette, writing from near Richmond, Indiana, gives a vivid account of an extraordinary thunder-storm and tornado which passed over that place, on Tuesday afternoon, June 4, and scattered destruction in its path. The writer says:

Soon after the first few peals of thunder, which were not severe, the rain set in accompanied with a perfect tornado of wind. In a few moments more the rain turned into hail, and fell in the most bewildering masses and with irresistible fury. So much so was this that it was impossible to tell from which direction it came. It seemed to come from all directions.

So sudden had been the accession of the storm, that many farmers were unconscious of its coming until they found it too late to get shelter for their stock, and scarcely for themselves. Horses that were hitched at the roadside broke away and ran for dear life. One farmer, near here, lost eighty out of a hundred chickens; and a farmer a mile down the road, a dozen lambs. The proprietors of the Water Cure have a very extensive conservatory, besides numerous hot-beds. The glass in them was totally demolished. Of course, the garden is a total wreck. Early tomatoes are useless stalks, and peas, beans, &c., are broken and spoiled utterly. But the worst feature of the case is the wheat. This, in the track of the storm, is totally ruined. Within sight of where I am writing are some six or eight fields of wheat, some of which I have to-day examined. The heads of every stock are either cut off or so broken down as to be beyond a resurrection. The farmers who are thus afflicted are utterly disheartened. For two years past the crop has been a failure, and this season, until yesterday, the wheat has been magnificent; so promising, indeed, that many have borrowed money on the strength of it, and are consequently bankrupt. It was supposed here last night that the fury of the storm had been spent in this immediate vicinity, and that the damage to the country at large had consequently been comparatively slight. The Gazette of to-day speaks of the violence of the storm as it raged in the city at five o'clock, and it must, therefore, have traveled the distance from here to there in about two hours and a half; hence, making about twenty miles an hour. How much destruction it has dealt in its path it will be hard to determine, but many a farmer who was well to do on yesterday morn is to-day penniless, with the hopes and labor of months past shattered and lost. Fortunately, the breadth of the storm's track was not great—variously estimated at a mile and a mile and a half—so that, although it mowed a clear swath as it went, it kindly left the acres on either side untouched. The trees suffered not less than the grain and the gardens. Hereabouts there was a fine prospect for fruit of all kinds, but the trees were either uprooted, or stripped of leaves or fruit, or both. There is a great diversity in the appearance of various trees, as on some the fruit remains, while the leaves are stripped, and on others the reverse is the case. The result will doubtless be the same in both cases. Many trees were not only unburdened of their infant fruit, but were uprooted entirely. Mr. James M. Starr, who has a fine residence in the suburbs of Richmond, has thirty shade trees torn up. Taken all in all, it was the most fearful and destructive storm that has prevailed hereabouts in the “memory of the oldest inhabitant.” Heaven spare us from any more of the same kind.

Accounts, also, from several interior counties in Missouri make mention of probably the same storm on the day previous, and in many places it did great damage to the fruit and crops. In some places hail-stones fell as large as hen's eggs, covering the ground completely, and remaining forty-eight hours.