“The Earthquakes”

Date

2-21-1812

Newspaper

Boston Yankee

Page and Column

Page 2, Column 3

Newspaper Location

Boston, Massachusetts

Serial Number

850

Abstract

Synopsis report from New Madrid on the damage caused by the New Madrid earthquakes. Article is undated but probably pertains to the December 16, 1811 earthquake. Damage noted was cracking of the earth. Notes that the land was totally changed around Little Prairie with land cracked. Mills destroyed, lakes converted into dry land and dry land into lakes, river banks caved in. The St. Francis river was noted to be low in places and overflowing the banks in others. it notes that the Mississippi river formed an eddy at Little Prairie and moved backwards for 15 to 20 minutes before flowing downstream again. Very detailed brief report.

Transcript

THE EARTHQUAKE. At New Madrid, Upper Louisiana, the shocks have been uncommonly violent-throwing down chimneys and houses, and compelling one third of the inhabitants to remove from the place to the adjacent hills, and the remainder to encamp in tents in open fields. The earth was so convulsed, as to render it difficult for one to keep his perpendicular position-the motion being estimated at about 12 inches to and fro. The shocks were accompanied with a partial darkness tremendous noise and sulphurous smell. Sixty-Seven shocks have been witnessed in all, which have split and cracked the earth in a hundred places in the neighborhood. During the violent shocks, the people by their yells and shrieks, discovered their extreme alarm, and upon one of those occasions a lady was known to faint and never recovered! The face of the country below, about Little Prairie has almost entirely changed; large lakes have been converted into dry land, and fields into lakes, the banks of the river fallen in, mills destroyed, and the earth cracked in every direction-The St. Francis was at one time very low, at another overflowing the surrounding country. At Little Prairie, the Mississippi is said to have formed an eddy, and presented a retrogade motion, and in 15 or 20 minute afterwards it resumed its course, and rose about five feet. Seven Indians are said to have been swallowed up in one of these apertures in the earth, one of which only made his escape, who states that his calamity was foretold by the Shawanoe Prophet for the destruction of the whites!

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