The Sun.
London, England, 1836-05-03 00:00:00

ANOTHER ACCOUNT.

We have been again visited with one of those severe
gales which have become so frequent latterly in our isle.
Since Friday it has been blowing very bard from the N.E.,
and the cold, particularly at night, has been intense. The
weather during the last two days and nights has more re-
sembled that which we used to experience in the early part
of March, and the character of May has been entirely
changed. On Sunday, with the exception of a few minutes
of sunshine at noon, the blasts were so piercing that pedes-
trians were either compelled to resume their winter clothing
or to return home and ensconce themselves by their own
firesides. In the evening the storm had so increased that
the suburban walks were almost impassable from the clouds
of dust occasionally flying about, and either blinding the
passengers or directing them into places of shelter. On
the northern roads the dust was very annoying, and the
mails and coaches were frequently enveloped in clouds of
fine road sand, making it a work of the greatest difficulty
for the drivers to guide their horses. The river all day
was like a rough sea, and barges and boats could scarcely
live on it. Several were capsized and stowed in, and their
cargoes lost. A waterman rowing a young man over in his
skiff from Limehouse to Deptford was unfortunately driven
against the mooring-chain of a ship, the skiff was upset,
and both went down before any assistance was rendered.
In the afternoon, about three o'clock, four boys were im-
prudently entrusted with a boat, and were rowing down the
river from Vauxhall, when the tide drove them athwart
the barges moored off the Penetentiary at Millbank, and
they were all immersed in the stream. Assistance was im-
mediately rendered, and three of the youths were saved by
the Thames Police and others, but the fourth, a youth
aged 18, whose parents reside in New-street, Gray's Inn-
road, met with a watery grave. At night the gale increased
to a perfect hurricane, and during the whole night the storm
raged with the greatest fury. Its effects were visible yes-
terday morning, both on land and water, and in the
great number of houses unroofed, chimney tops blown
down, outhouses destroyed, and ships which had been
driven from their moorings and damaged. The nursery
gardens and plantations in the vicinity of the metropolis
have experienced great injury, and the accounts from all
quarters speak of the disastrous effects of the gale, particu-
larly on the coast, and the next intelligence at Lloyd's
is looked forward to with much anxiety and trem-
bling. The steamers expected yesterday, however, arrived
in due course, and among them was the Royal Adelaide
Scotch steam-ship, from Leith, which rode out the storm
in safety, without a plank being injured, and she was safely
moored at St. Katharine's Wharf at two. The small
steamers proceeding downwards to Greenwich, Woolwich,
and Gravesend, made rather long passages, for the flood
tide and the high winds converted the river into a rapid
current, and the northerly gales having blown the water up
the Channel, the tide in the afternoon rose to a most ex-
traordinary height, and overflowed the banks of the river.
The lower parts of Blackwell, Limehouse, Shadwell,
Wapping, and Westminster, on the Middlesex shore, and
Deptford, I3ankside, Lambeth, and Vauxhall, on the Sur-
rey side, were under water for upwards of an hour. In
High-street, Wapping, from Wapping New Stairs to Exe-
cution Dock, the water was from three to four feet in
depth, and, washing into the cellars, shops, warehouses,
granaries, and floors level with the street, has destroyed
much valuable property, and damaged flour and other pe-
rishable articles to a serious extent. The tide flowed until
fifteen minutes past three o'clock, forty minutes later than
was set down in the tide tables. At that time Bankside from
St. Saviour's church to Holland-street, near Blackfriars-road,
was impassable, and the flood carried everything before it,
and rushing down the narrow streets and alleys leading to
Park-street and other parts of Southwark entered the humble
dwellings of the lower classes, breaking away doors, setting-
ting their furniture afloat, and compelling the inmates to
retreat into the upper floors until the tide ebbed. The
Tower wharf was overflowed, a circumstance which has
not happened for many years, but it may give some
idea of the unusual height of yesterday's tide, which was
so rapid as to carry away various embankments and in-
undate houses and fields nn the banks of the Thames,
which had never been visited by the water. A great
many poor individuals in the lower parts of Lambeth
have had all their little property washed away by the
sudden irruption of the river, and a good deal of the
market garden ground in the neighbourhood of Fulham
and Battersea has been laid under water. As these in-
undations do not happen seldom, and have been attended
occasionally with very disastrous effects, particularly since
the removal of the Old London Bridge, it is a matter
of astonishmeat that the City Authorities, the Water-
men's Company;and the owners of wharfs and property on
the banks of the river have not attended more particularly
to the security of the embankments. The encroachments
of the high tides could be effectually guarded against in
many places on both shores if the banks were raised and
the stairs and public plying places made a few feet higher.
The wind moderated in some degree in the evening of yes-
terday, though it still continued to blow rather fresh, and
should the breeze continue from the same quarter we may
expect another and much higher tide this. morning at
three o'clock.