“Earthquake”
Date
12-23-1811
Newspaper
Mirror of the Times
Page and Column
Page 3, Column 3
Newspaper Location
Augusta, Georgia
Serial Number
627
Abstract
Detailed felt report for Augusta, Georgia for the December 16, 1811 earthquake. Mentions stopping of clock pendulum and direction. Mentions effect at Milledgeville, Georgia was to cause clock bell to ring at statehouse in the cupola.
Transcript
EARTHQUAKE . On Monday last the 16th inst. the inhabitants of this city were alarmed with the shock of an Earthquake, at about 35 minutes past 2 o'clock in the morning. In about three quarters of an hour, those who continued awake, felt a second shock. At 33 minutes past 7 in the morning commenced a third, which lasted three minutes and a half by a watch; and in about a quarter of an hour, there was another small vibration. About noon on Tuesday, another shock was perceivable. Those felt by us appeared to be of the vibrating kind, not the pulfatory. Their direction was with the course of the river Savannah, or nearly east and west; a fact not merely ascertained by ocular demonstration, in that which happened after sun-rise, but by the stoppage of a Clock at 3 o'clock, which stood at right angles with the river; and whose pendulum would, of course, have received a fresh momentum from a shock in that direction, instead of being stopped. The first shock appeared to last nearly as long as that whose duration was observed. The concussion was so severe in Milledgeville as to cause the clapper of the Bell belonging to the Clock in the Cupulo of the State House to strike repeatedly.
Recommended Citation
"“Earthquake”" (1811). New Madrid Compendium Far-Field Database. 614.
https://digitalcommons.memphis.edu/cas-ceri-new-madrid-compendium/614
