Owingsville outlook. [volume] (Owingsville, Ky.) 1879-192?, 1896-10-08
A TIDAL WAVE
Almost Wipes Cedar Keys, Fla, From
the Face of the Earth.
The Loss nf life and Property Is Enormous
Many SponEiu= Vessels, With Their
Crews, Go - the Bottom-Iho
Storm N Georgia.

Al'lhAilE anu NN' l'' 'hi'iE u INV N'h'h-
ern part in a mrthcaNtcriy direction
| Ia death and destruction in it, path.
Owing To the prosiration of tclc-
! graph wires and the delay of trains,
due 1" wa>h"u'~. oaly maarcr reports
have been received, and yet, mragcr aS
| those reports are, they show that over
20 towns and villa res have been wreck
ell and that a or - persons have been
! killed, while probably thrice a. many
more received wounds more or less SER
| ious.
About I o'clock in the morning the
| hurricane, valch had been churning
the gulf, left the water and Swonpcd
down upon Cedar Keys, a town of
| 1000 inhahitlnt~. about one hundred
miles southeast of Jacksonville.
| JAok>oNNIIIT. lla-. oct. =. CEDAR
| Keys Is place 81 dr-olation aud death.
| TUESDAY il wa~ a thriving town Of
| 100 inhabitants Thursday many of
the people are corpsr>, scores al others
are in urci and there arc but few
houses left standing. Twenty corpscs
| have been recovered and il is known
that many others are dead. OF those
recovered but few have been idrnti-
fled, 80 mutilatcd were they Y failing
| timhcrs.
| Many Of the corpSeS were dug out Of
/ the mad in which they were buried 10y
| the mighty tidal wave that swept over
the town Tuesday morning.
/ The storm struck this place about
| $3.50 o'cl"ri, Tuesday morning and con-
! tinucd for several huur>. Though
warning had been given, nothing in
dicatcd a blow of unusual severity
At : o'clncl, an immense tital wave
came in from the south, carrying de-
| struction with i. Boats. wharves and
small houses were hurled upon the
shore, and, breaking into fragments.
| cove red the street with wrcckagc and
rendered them almost impossible,
while the torrents of water rushing
| through every open space would take
| the strongest man OF his feet
1t was this tidal wave that caused
the principal loss of life, many houses
beiLg swept from their foundations
and inmates drowned. OF the 20 bod
les recovered l. are white and col
orcd.
The Mary Eliza, a sronging schooner,
reached Cedar Keys at ten O'Clock
| Thursday morning. jury rugged, nav
ing had 10 cut both masts away to pre-
vent capsizing She reports that at
| dark Monday night nearly 100 vessels
were anchored ON the sponge bar just
below Cedar Keys AMI that nearly
every one of them was sunk 10y the
| Hurricanes.
beyond the bar the tops Of scores of
masts are visible just above the water
ANA each top indicates the burial place
of sponging schooner and its crew.
| As these vessels carried from four to
ten men, the loss OF life is horrible to
contemplate.
! When the tidal wave came and over
whelmcd the houses many OF the in
mates floated in the water. ciinging To
pieces of timber. Others chung to tree
! tops for hours until the water rcccdcd.
They were buifeted by wind and
wave, and many women tainted,
| clinging, though, even while I'M
conscious, with a death grip 10 the sue
I ring limbs. They all snow a =
: Of a. tor tattered AptEiu- a ?
, hTul,e" h'..,'s, nut Wcrc Iiid 20 escape
with their hes. Many others s.re still
unacc, ln;ed for, aud families sua
/ friends are filled with anxiety ."u-...
| for the best, but fearing the worst.
Reliable news of the storm from the
western part of Levy and Alac. IA
\ counties has just reached jacksonville.
| Not less than 200 families are left dcsti-
tutc. All their houses, fencing and
crops are totally destroyed. What
they had gathered was blown away
with the buildings.
The town of Needmore was demol-
ished. The post office building at that
place was completely demolished, and
the postmaster can find no part of the
mail or post office fixtures Every
house At lular, Judson and Chietland
was destroyed with one or two eNcep-
tions, killing people at both the former
places.
| SAVANNAH, Ga, Oct. Photograph
communication between Savannah and
Florida has not been re-established
since the hurricane of Tuesday snapped
the wires as it came up northward
from the gulf. From advices which
have reached here of the storms work
| in Florida cover the state pretty fully,
but have come by mail.
The blow came ashore from the gulf
on the coast line extending from Tam
pa to Cedar Keys, Tampa getting only
the southern edge of the blow. Its
path across the state was a narrow
one. although "A large area seems to
have been affected. in greater or less
degree, by what might be called the
edges of the storm. The registry of
the velocity of the wind at the govern
ment weather bureau at jacksonville
showed the remarkable and unprece-
denied record of nearly 100 miles an
hour. This terrific gale fortunately
lasted only about a minute. but for
five minutes of which it was a part,
the velocity was shown to be rather
more than seventy miles an hour. The
path of greatest severity of the storm
seems to have been about forty miles
wide After passing over a strip of
territory living within the northern
part of the state, the storm, according