# 1840 Natchez tornado

The Great Natchez tornado was a deadly and "powerful" (the tornado may have been an F4-F5) tornado that hit Natchez, Mississippi, on Thursday, May 7, 1840. The tornado was the second-deadliest tornado in United States history; at least 317 people were killed and at least 109 were injured. While officially unrated, it is retrospectively estimated to have been at least a violent F4 tornado on the Fujita scale. Its 35-mile-long (56 km), 1,000-yard-wide (910 m; 3,000 ft; 0.57 mi; 0.91 km) path was marked by severe damage and uncertain estimates of casualties, though many enslaved Africans—possibly numbering in the hundreds—reportedly died on plantations in Louisiana.

## May 6 "hurricane"

The day before the Natchez tornado, a "hurricane" crossed through Natchitoches Parish. As told in a 1920 history of the area, "The Natchez hurricane, on May 6, 1840, swept over the Southern part of Natchitoches Parish, coming from the Southwest, originating in the Gulf of Mexico. The day following, May 7th, another followed, in the identical path of the other."

## Event description

This massive tornado formed approximately twenty miles southwest of Natchez, shortly before 1 p.m., and moved northeast along the Mississippi River. It followed the river directly, stripping forests from both shores. The vortex then struck the river-port of Natchez Landing, located below the bluff from Natchez. This windstorm tossed 116 flatboats (of the 120 docked at Natchez that day) into the river, drowning their crews and passengers. One report estimated that 200 boatmen had been killed. Other boats were picked up and thrown onto land. A piece of a steamboat window was reportedly found 30 miles (48 km) from the river. Many doing business on shore were also killed. At Natchez Landing, the destruction of dwellings, stores, steamboats and flatboats was almost complete. It then moved into the town of Natchez, though its full width of devastation also included the river and the Louisiana village of Vidalia immediately across from Natchez. It was reported, "the air was black with whirling eddies of walls, roofs, chimneys and huge timbers from distant ruins ... all shot through the air as if thrown from a mighty catapult." The central and northern portions of Natchez were slammed by the funnel and many buildings were completely destroyed. Forty-eight people were killed on land, and 269 others were killed on the river. Natchez-Under-the-Hill, the town's steamboat landing and red light district, presented "a scene of desolation and ruin which sickens the heart and beggars description—all, all, is swept away, and beneath the ruins still lay crushed the bodies of many strangers. It would fill volumes to depict the many escapes and heart-rending scenes; one of the most interesting was the rescue of Mrs. Alexander from the ruins of the steamboat hotel; she was found greatly injured, with the two children in her arms, and they both dead!"
The damage to the landscape was said to be substantial and lasting: "Unparallelled was the destruction of this hurricane. For miles the view was unobstructed, the timber was all destroyed, and at Pierre La Butte Bluffs the top soil was all blown off in places for several feet. The matter in the soil that supplied the arborescent fibre was blown away or destroyed, and the timber to this day, is a stunted diminutive growth, although it has been 80 years since the storm occurred. The violence of the storm passed about half a mile below the mouth of Cane river, and its path crossed Red river. Eli Du Bois and Landry Carasco were blown across river, and lodged in a thorn tree, unhurt. A cart and yoke of oxen were blown across the river, and were unhurt. The track of this destructive hurricane, crossed latt Lake and Suoffords Creek, and the effects of it are visible today. At Natchez the destruction was awful. Several steamboats were destroyed. The Hines [sic] was blown into the river, and capsized, and the crew and all the passengers were lost, except four. The wreck of the Hines was afterwards found at Baton Rouge, with 51 dead bodies on board, 48 males, and 3 females. Among the latter was a little girl of three years. The Prairie, just arrived from St. Louis, the whole upper deck was blown off, all passengers and crew were blown into the river, and drowned, among the number four ladies. The wharf boat and two hundred flat boats sank, and many lives were lost. Four hundred people were known to have been killed." The steamboat Hinds was recovered and brought to shore roughly two weeks after the storm. The Prairie was left "lying at our wharf torn to pieces 'blown up' by the wind worse than [any] boat was blown up by steam. The hull and machinery is all that is left of her. Her cabin was carried away, floor and all. The wheel houses were unroofed, and what remains of the boat is rent and shattered in an awful manner." The steamboat St. Lawrence was also reported destroyed; according to an early dispatch, "she was lifted many feet out of the water and instantly dashed to the bottom of the river with every soul on board."
The tornado struck Concordia Parish, Louisiana first if the tornado was traveling northwest. The parish courthouse at Vidalia was flattened, killing Judge Keeton. P. M. Lapice owned a sugar plantation in the path of the storm, and "suffered immensely in his Arno plantation, below Vidalia. His negro quarters were all blown down, four or five negroes killed outright, about twenty dangerously, some of them mortally wounded, and thirty or forty more seriously injured. His plantation has resounded with groans since the storm. He estimates his loss at thirty thousand dollars". The Free Trader stated, "Reports have come in from plantations 20 miles distant in Louisiana, and the rage of the tempest was terrible. Hundreds of (slaves) killed, dwellings swept like chaff from their foundations, the forest uprooted, and the crops beaten down and destroyed. Never, never, never, was there such desolation and ruin." Henry Tooley reported that there were 74 injuries in the city of Natchez and 35 injuries on the River.
Senate Document No. 199 (27th Congress, 2nd Session) was the report of the commission to fix the border line between the United States and the Republic of Texas. In the Journal of the Joint Commission under date of May 26, 1840, scouts reported observations made in the vicinity of the Sabine River, which is the boundary between Louisiana and Texas, "We crossed to-day the path of a recent tornado, which had prostrated trees and cane on the river banks. Its course was observed to be from south 72 degrees west to north 72 degrees east, and the track to be from 300–400 yards [270–370 meters] wide. This was supposed to be the same tornado which occasioned such dreadful destruction of human lives and houses in Natchez on the 7th of May."
The first news account of the tornado was written for the New Orleans Picayune at 5 p.m. and sent downriver on the steamboat Meteor. Local businessmen "Mr. Ruffner and S. J. Boyd Esq." estimated the financial loss to be US$1,260,000 (equivalent to $39,685,800 in 2024). Planter Stephen Duncan reportedly "paid the rent" so Dr. Pollard could house and treat the injured at the Tremont House hotel, which was converted to be a hospital during the crisis. Other slave owning capitalists in the area sent "large gangs of slaves" to work clearing away debris and extricating the bodies of victims from the collapsed buildings where they died.

## Aftermath

The final death toll was 48 on land (with 47 deaths in Natchez and one in Vidalia) and 269 on the river, mostly from the sinking of flatboats. In addition to the 317 deaths, only 109 were injured, a testament to the tornado's intensity. The tornado is to this day ranked as the second deadliest in American history, and caused $1,260,000 in damage. The actual death toll may be higher than what is listed, as slave deaths were often not counted during this time period.
Regarding a final death count, CNN reported "The official death toll may not have included slaves, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency."