AWFUL AND DESTRUCTIVE STORM. On Saturday last, 23d inst., this town was visited by one of the most awful and destructive storms ever experienced here, sweeping away and laying prostrate almost everything in its course. The gale commenced early in the morning at north east and continued increasing in violence (the wind varying from N. E. to S. E. and S. W.) until 11 A. M., when it began to abate, and about one o'clock all danger from the wind and tide was over and the afternoon was fair and mild, forming a striking contrast with the war of the elements which had existed but a few minutes before. The tide rose three and a half feet higher than it had ever been known before. At Providence it rose seven feet higher than ever before. To attempt to particularize the suffering, to estimate the losses, is impossible. Two dwelling houses and nine stores and workshops on the Long Wharf were carried away by the violence of the wind and tide, and those that withstood the gale are rendered almost untenable by the vessels, lumber, &c. being driven against them. Several of the stores carried away contained a considerable amount of property in West India and other goods, which as nearly all lost. One of the houses swept from the Long Wharf was occupied by Mr. Andrew V. Allan, and such was the rapidity and violence of the storm that every attempt to save his family was in vain; they all perished, his wife, three children and a girl that lived with them. The wharves on the Point, with most of the stores, stables, &c., on them were carried away. The wharves in other parts of the town, with the stores on them, also sustained very considerable injury, and everything movable on the wharves was swept away. In some of the stores the water was four feet deep. The Long Wharf has sustained great damage and the stores on the head of the wharf are much shattered, and their contents (four, sugar, corn, tobacco, &c.) damaged by the tide. The large three-story store of Gov. Martin was removed nearly six feet from its foundation. A large three-story store on Rhodes & Cahoone's Wharf, containing hemp and flour, was taken from its foundation and floated into the harbor. The town, after the gale, was a scene which defies description. Many of our streets were rendered impassable by the quantity of goods, lumber, wood, spars, wrecks of houses, vessels, trees, &c., lying in every direction. The steeples of the first and second Congregational Churches were partly blown down, the roofs of the Episcopal Church and First Congregational were partly carried away, and other public edifices have sustained considerable injury. We dare not venture to risk a calculation as to the amount of damage sustained, but it is very great. Many poor families have lost their all and were happy to escape with their lives. The scene was such as was never before witnessed by our oldest inhabitants. The uprooting of huge trees, some of which have braved the fury of the elements for nearly a century, part of the town inundated, the wind blowing a hurricane, a prodigious swell running, some buildings falling to pieces, the sea beating against others with a fury surpassed only by the breakers of our sea shore; and amidst all these horrors were seen families struggling to escape their houses, and persons striving to save their property. After the storm the outside of the windows in the town was found coated with a fine salt which, it seems was conveyed from the ocean through the air, and the leaves of the trees, from this cause, as is supposed, are curled and crisped as with a general blast. Two brigs were driven on the tops of the wharves; four sloops were driven on the top of the Long Wharf; a sloop with wood was carried over the Long Wharf on to the Point; another was driven into the cove, and two sloops were sunk at Long Wharf. Much damage was done to the towns situated on the Narragansett Bay and along the shores and a number of lives lost in this disastrous gale. __________________ Date of the storm: September 23, 1815 "Services at the Dedication of the School House Erected by the Trustees of the Long wharf, at Newport Rhode Island, May 20th, 1863 with an Appendix." Page 69-70, Appendix C: Abstract from the Record of the Long Wharf. -- Susan W. Pieroth