The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1881-06-30
Storm at the Signal Station, Mt.
Washington.

Noticing that the sides of the summit
were strewn with boards, beams and
debris of all sorts. my guide explained
that what / saw was the result of the
great January gale. which had demol-
ished the large she'd used as an engine
house, scattering the loose fragments
far and wide. begged him to give
me, his recollection of It.
During the forenoon preceding the
gale we observed nothing very unusual;
but the clouds kept sinking and sink
ing until the summit was quite above
them. Late in the afternoon my COM
rade, Sergeant M, came to where /
was lying abed sick, and said, There
is going to be the dickens to pay, so
guess I'll make everything snug.
by nine in the evening the wind
had increased to one hundred miles an
hour, with heavy sleet At midnight
the velocity of the storm was one hum
dred and twenty miles. and the exposed
thermometer recorded twenty-four de-
grees below zero. With the stove red,
we could hardly get it above freezing
inside the house. Water froze within
three feet of the fre-in fact, where
you are now sitting.
." AT this time the noise outside was
deatening. About one o'clock the
wind rose to one hundred and fifty
miles. 1t was now blowing hurricane.
The wind. gathering up all the loose
ice of the mountain, dashed it against
the house with one continued roar. i
lay wondering how long the building
would stand this, when all at once came
a crash. M shouted to me to get
up; but 1 had tumbled out in a hurry
on hearing the glass go. You see, ]
was dressed, to keep myself warm in
bed.
"Our united efforts were hardly
equal to closing the storm shutters from
the inside, but we finally succeeded,
though the lights went out when the
wind came in, and we worked in the
dark
He rose to show me how the shutters,
of thick oak, were first secured by an
iron bar, and secondly by strong wood
en- buttons firmly screwed in the win
dow-frame.
ave had scarcely done this" re-
sumed Doyle, land were shivering over
the fire, when heavy grist of wind
as if they had never been fastened at
all. We sprang to our feet. After a
hard tussle we again secured the win
dows, by mailing a cleat to the floor,
| against which one end of board was
fixed, using the other end as a lever.
You understand nodded. "Well,
even then il was all we could do to
force the shutters back into place. But
we did il. We had to do it.
The rest of the night was passed in
momentary expectation that the build
ing would be blown into Tuckerman's
and we with it. At four o'clock in the
morning the wind registered one hun
dred and eighty-six miles. 1t had
shifted them from east to northeast.
From this time it steadily fell to ten
miles, at nine o'clock. This was the
biggest blow ever experienced on the
mountain"
"Suppose the house had gone, and
the hotel stood fast, could you have
effected an entrance into the hotelr' ]
asked.
"We could not have faced the gale"
"Not for a hundred feet? not in a
matter of life and deathP"
Impossible. The wind would have
lifted us from our feet like bags of wool.
We would have been dashed against the
rocks. and smashed like egg shells"
was the qniet reply.
"And so for some hours you expect
ed to be swept into eternityp"
1--WE did what we could. Each
wrapped himself in blankets and quilts.
binding these tightly around him with
ropes, to which were attached bars of
iron, SO that il the house went by the
board we might stand a chance-a slim
one-of anchoring somewhere, some
how"
Somewhere, indeedi
When, on the following morning, l
busted myself getting ready to go down
the mountain, / heard a profound sigh,
followed by some half-audible words,
preceding from the adjoining room.
These words rang in my ears all that
day:
"Ah, this horrible solitude. Us. a.
Drake, IN Hdrper's Magazine.