Jordi loves literature and climatology and they have been talking about The Great Storm, a destructive extratropical cyclone that struck central and southern England on a day like today in 1703.
The Great Storm of 1703 was a destructive extratropical cyclone that struck central and southern England on 26 November 1703 or 7 December 1703 in the Gregorian calendar in use today.
High winds caused 2,000 chimney stacks to collapse in London and damaged the New Forest, which lost 4,000 oaks. Ships were blown hundreds of miles off-course, and over 1,000 seamen died on the Goodwin Sands alone. News bulletins of casualties and damage were sold all over England –a novelty at that time.
The Church of England declared that the storm was God's vengeance for the sins of the nation. Daniel Defoe thought it was a divine punishment for poor performance against Catholic armies in the War of the Spanish Succession.
Contemporary observers recorded barometric readings as low as 973 millibars but it has been suggested that the storm deepened to 950 millibars over the Midlands. Retrospective analysis conjectures that the storm was consistent with a Category 2 hurricane.
More information: BBC
In London alone, approximately 2,000 massive chimney stacks were blown down. The lead roofing was blown off Westminster Abbey and Queen Anne had to shelter in a cellar at St James's Palace to avoid collapsing chimneys and part of the roof.
On the Thames, some 700 ships were heaped together in the Pool of London, the section downstream from London Bridge. HMS Vanguard was wrecked at Chatham. Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell's HMS Association was blown from Harwich to Gothenburg in Sweden before way could be made back to England. Pinnacles were blown from the top of King's College Chapel, in Cambridge.
There was extensive and prolonged flooding in the West Country, particularly around Bristol. Hundreds of people drowned in flooding on the Somerset Levels, along with thousands of sheep and cattle, and one ship was found 24 km inland. Approximately 400 windmills were destroyed, with the wind driving their wooden gears so fast that some burst into flames.
At Wells, Bishop Richard Kidder and his wife were killed when two chimneystacks in the palace fell on them, asleep in bed. This same storm blew in part of the great west window in Wells Cathedral. Major damage occurred to the southwest tower of Llandaff Cathedral at Cardiff in Wales.
At sea, many ships were wrecked, some of which were returning from helping Archduke Charles, the claimed King of Spain, fight the French in the War of the Spanish Succession. These ships included HMS Stirling Castle, HMS Northumberland, HMS Mary and HMS Restoration, with about 1,500 seamen killed particularly on the Goodwin Sands. Between 8,000 and 15,000 lives were lost overall.
More information: Get History
The first Eddystone Lighthouse of Plymouth was destroyed on 27 November 1703 (Old Style), killing six occupants, including its builder Henry Winstanley. John Rudyard was later contracted to build the second lighthouse on the site. A ship torn from its moorings in the Helford River in Cornwall was blown for 320 km before grounding eight hours later on the Isle of Wight. The number of oak trees lost in the New Forest alone was 4,000.
The storm of 1703 caught a convoy of 130 merchant ships sheltering at Milford Haven, along with their man of war escorts Dolphin, Cumberland, Coventry, Looe, Hastings and Hector. By 3:00pm the next afternoon, losses included 30 vessels.
The storm was unprecedented in ferocity and duration and was generally reckoned by witnesses to represent the anger of God, in recognition of the crying sins of this nation. The government declared 19 January 1704 a day of fasting, saying that it loudly calls for the deepest and most solemn humiliation of our people. It remained a frequent topic of moralising in sermons well into the 19th century.
The Great Storm also coincided with the increase in English journalism, and was the first weather event to be a news story on a national scale. Special issue broadsheets were produced detailing damage to property and stories of people who had been killed.
Daniel Defoe produced his full-length book The Storm (July 1704) in response to the calamity, calling it the tempest that destroyed woods and forests all over England. He wrote: No pen could describe it, nor tongue express it, nor thought conceive it unless by one in the extremity of it.
Coastal towns such as Portsmouth looked as if the enemy had sackt them and were most miserably torn to pieces. Winds of up to 130 km/h destroyed more than 400 windmills.
Defoe reported that the sails in some turned so fast that the friction caused the wooden wheels to overheat and catch fire. He thought that the destruction of the sovereign fleet was a punishment for their poor performance against the Catholic armies of France and Spain during the first year of the War of the Spanish Succession.
Download The Great Storm of November 1703 by Dennis Wheeler
It is not light that we need, but fire;
it is not the gentle shower, but thunder.
We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.
Frederick Douglass
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