Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1888-03-23
THE GREAT STORM.
WHERE IT CAME FROM. HOW IT
SPREAD AND HOW 1T DIS
APPEARED.

of the Baltimore Sun says
The signal service bureau has al
ready collected valuable and inter
esting data concerning the recent
storm. Probably, indeed, 1t mas
now all the information concerning
the tempest which is OF conse'
Guence. While it was in some
parts of its course exception ally
violent end destructive, it is not
regarded at the bureau as phe'
nomenal either In its character or
its effects. March is the month OF
storms and winds, and always at
this period of the year atmospheric
disturbances of more or less inten'
sity are looked for. Thousands of
persons in Washington have a very
distinct remembrance of the bitter
ly inclement weather of March q,
1873, the day of General Grants
second Inauguration, when the
wind and storm swept people OIL
their feet, and the biting blast
pierced to the marrow. lt was
said that at least a hundred per
sons here came to their death from
exposure on that day and evening.
Not a few of this number were
ladies who caught cold in tue in-
auguration ballroom, where the
brandy froze solid. In the storm
of Sunday there was no such fall
of snow and no such accumulation
of drifts as in the great storm OF
January, 1857, to which such
graphic allusion is made IN the
Sun this morning. But at all
events, the late storm vas suih-
ciently severe to inspire general
hope that there will not soon be a
repetition on a similar scale. The
most remarkable feature of the
storm was the length OF distance
which il Travelled and its zig-zag
course. It gathered in the Pa
cific ocean, burst upon the coast OF
California, some miles to the south
of San Francisco, at midnight on
the 9Th instant, just one week ago.
1t DETECTED to the north, swept
over San Francisco, and, after
traversing nearly the entire breadth
OF California again, DETECTED to
the south. 1t gained strength and
fury as it careered along. and
midway through Colorado it broke
by the force of its own weight, and
the two sections parted company
almost at right angles. One half,
with its burden of snow and rain,
dropped from its ample bosom
deluges over Colorado, Nebraska,
Iowa and Michigan; short across
the broad waters of Ontario into
Canada, where its track was lost
sight of far up in the north at three
o'clock on Sunday afternoon, al
most at the same moment that
Washington, Baltimore, Philadel'
phia and New York were begin
ming to feel the fall force OF the
blows of the other half. This latter
half, starting from Colorado
Springs, for a time travelled due
south, moistened the fields of New
Mexico. touched with it's breath the
borders of Texas, beat fercely over
Arkansas and Tennessee, crossed
into Georgia at midnight of Satur-
day, sped toward the coast and
upward with terrible velocity
shadowing with its darkness and
overwhelming with its torrent
four great cities at one and the
same moment. Swiftly Fastening
but leaving its imprint on state
after state, it, too, passed into the
British dominions, and then, by
way of Nova Scotia, it bid final
adieu to land, and late yesterday
afternoon rushed into the Atlantic
to be at last swallowed up perhaps
thousand miles away. Thus
these clouds Of storm, which
were born in the Pacific, probably
in their erratic course travelled ter
Thousand miles before meeting then
crave in the Atlantic. The rapid
ty and the course of that section o
the storm which struck the South
ern Atlantic coast produced those
disturbances and disarrangement'
| in the atmospheric currents whlcl
resulted in 80 marked lowering o
the temperature. Great bodies o
cold air which were moving dowT
from the north we're sucked in a
through a funnel. This admixtur'
turned rain into snow, and set tn
seal of winter once more where tn
FIRST touch of spring had been gent
. ly felt. Fierce as was the storn
I the direct damages it caused do no
o compare with the loss which ha
r frequently resulted from summe
= rains and winds. The interruption
of railway communication has bee
mainly caused by PROSTATE tel'
graph poles and wires. But 70
them partial communication a
least would in all probability hav
been restored in a few hours. Th
, successive layers of rain and sno'
, which fell upon the wires congea
cd almost instantly, and the wire
in a comparatively short time wei
. wrapped IN a coating of sold il
inches thick. General Greeley sal
= ,this evening he thought 1t 10
A.Ao - ,,,,f tha tvaiUhf bqt WOO