THE GREAT STORM OF MIDSUMMER DAY, 1897. 123
fury that was terrifying. Windows facing the north and north-west were
broken by the thousand, and in less than ten minutes, for about which space
of time the stress of the storm lasted, the town of Chelmsford looked for all
the world like a place that had been bombarded by a hostile army. So
thickly was the air charged with the rain and hail that it was impossible to
see across a street. The roadways were whipped up and the graveland pebbles
made to dance ; wherever there was a weak place in a roof the storm found it,
and water poured into rooms and down staircases ; chimney-pots were hurled
from their places ; cellars were flooded, and the streets were turned into
rushing and turbid rivers. Trees were stripped of their leaves, and some
even of their branches, while flowers, and, indeed, all other things in gardens,
were remorsely cut to pieces."
At "Melbournes" Mr. Rosling made the following observations :—"The
storm began soon after 3.0 p.m., and came from S.W. Before it reached us
it became very dark, and we could hear the roar of the storm as it approached
then a few hailstones about the size of marbles ; then the storm was upon us,
with lightning, and in half-an-hour it was all over, but as we were in the
track, windows and crops were almost totally destroyed." Dr. Thresh,
at "Spergula," measured 1.14 in. of rain in 15 minutes, and Mr
Chancellor's gauge in the High Street registered 1.37 in 20 minutes.
At "Melbournes," near Chelmsford, Mr. Rosling measured 1.08 in. in 25
minutes, but as the hail would not be caught in the gauge he was unable
to give the total amount. The hailstones were of various shapes, some
globular, some oval, some oblong, some like sections of cylinders, and some
exactly like small saucers, the edges resembling white lace, while the centres
consisted of transparent ice, bluish in colour. Mr. Charles Pertwee picked
up in the garden of "Claremont," London Road, two of the cylindrical
shaped hailstones, which he found upon measurement to be five-eights of an
inch thick, and one and one-eighth inches across. It seemed as if raindrops
were congealed on the surfaces of the original stones. Mr. Rosling at
"Melbournes." observed that the larger hailstones were 2 in. long by 11/2 to 13/4
wide, and 1/2 in. thick. In Chelmsford High Street the hail actually blocked
up many of the doors to premises. Mr. Pertwee had more than 200 squares
of glass broken. The corrugated iron shed of Messrs. Hodge and Taylor,
near the railway, was so riddled by the hail that it looked as if it had been
shot at. About 25 sheets of the iron were pierced.
The reported damage fills two or three columns in the newspapers, and it
will be sufficient to quote from Mr. J. B. Pash's account of the destruction
wrought at the Essex Industrial School, as a sample of the scores of like
incidents : "All the windows and doors on the west front of the large building
used as a gymnasium were blown in and the roof carried off, portions of which
were blown by the wind clean over the adjoining field into the field beyond, a
distance of 530 feet, large sheets of iron going this distance. On the main
building of the School a large chimney stack was blown down, masses of the
brickwork going through the roof into the room below, destroying the furni-
ture. Every window ou the west front of the building was broken. The
noise of the hailstones (some of which were an inch in diameter) can only be
compared to the rattling of bullets from a troop of soldiers, and the hailstones
were in such quantity that the ground adjoining was completely white, as after
a heavy snowstorm, many of the hail stones remaining on the ground for over