GALES IN VICTORIA.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Volume I, Issue 34, 26 August 1863, Page 6

GALES IN VICTORIA.

By the following extract from the " Bendigo Dispatch/' it will be seen that we have not been the only sufferers by the elements during the past tempestuous winter:— Throughout the past week Sandhurst has been visited with a succession of gales and storms, which threatened to unroof the frail habitations of many of our digging community; but no one anticipated that any serious amount of damage would arise from these squalls. Friday night, however, deceived even the weather wise, and about midnight, after rude Boreas, blustering and whistling, had rendered houseless several poor families, a sort of whirlwind, which was seen travelling over hill and dale like a volume of white smoke, spent itself in the neighbourhood of Golden Square, scattering destruction and destitution wherever it struck. Substantial brick houses were levelled with the ground; verandahs, several yards in length, were carried bodily over the house tops (the posts being effectually lifted out of their sockets) and dropped at a distance from the owners' domiciles; slab huts and weatherboard houses, almost innumerable, were as dust before the wind, and in fact everything that was at all shaky, and a great deal that was not, succumbed to the fury of the storm. While all this destruction was going on, the lightning was flashing, the thunder was roaring and the rain coming down with all the vehemence of an Australian storm; and it is thought by some that the lightning played its part in the general destruction of life and properity. Golden Square is one henp of ruins, and several hundreds of pound* must be spent in making good the damage 01* the more extensive premises which have been wholly or partially destroyed are the Waterworks Hotel, the front of which represented something like twenty-five feet of brick wall and wood-work. All this was levelled with the ground, with the exception of two small rooms, which were spared, minus the roofs. Bottles containing wines and spirits of every description, together with an array of glass, were knocked down like ninepins, and the counter shivered to splinters; the billiardroom, in which were five or six persons playing, shared the fate of the front of the house; but, fortunately, every one made his escape without serious injury. The verandah of Mr. Neveson's house was swept away, and deposited two or three hundred yards from the premises; a slab stable thirty feet long was also blown down ; the windows of the Wesleyan Church (Mr. David's) were smashed to atoms, but the edifice was otherwise uninjured; the stores of Messrs. Ailingham and Moore, the forge of Mr. Barnes, and the premises occupied by Mr. Dorizzi, bootmaker, were unroofed and rendered comfortless ; the front of Cameron's store was blown out, and the roof of O'Neill's store carried away; but the Wheatsheaf Hotel escaped, with the exception of losing its flagstaff; verandahs "ad infinitum" were torn up and tents blown to ribbons. Nor was the damage exactly cenfined to Golden-square, for we' bear of it also jfi the town; the office of the late coroner, at the corner of M'Crae-street, having been also demolished. Back Creek felt it also, as there the chimney of the saw- j mills was brought to the groundhvith a tre- I mendous crash; whilst at Epsom the chimney j of the smelting-house attached to the Oriental Bank was blown down. j

The storm caused great havoc at Sebastian, Whipstick, and Myers' Flats, and the surrounding neighborhood, the ground being strewn with evidences of the terrible force of the wind. At these places, as elsewhere, the calico habitations suffered greatly, flys were blown to ribbons, and tents lifted bodily into the air, to the consternation of the inmates. Trees were stripped of their branches, and then hurled along with the fury of the blast, threatening destruction to everything in their way, and many were the narrow escapes from serious injuries Large trees appeared but toys in grip of the roaring monster, and were torn up by the roots and dashed to the earth with a fearful crash. There is a rumor, which it is feared is only too true, that one man has lost his life by the falling of a tree at Lockwood. It appears that five men, working there as fencers, inhabited one tent, and during the height of the violence of the gale a tree was blown over and fell on the tent, crushing it and killing one of the men; the others, it is believed, escaped with little injury. In many places fences were blown down, bark roofs torn from huts, and even slab and brick houses were levelled with the ground. In Sailor's Gully a brickchapel, being erected for the Bible Christians, had a large portion of the side wall blown in; and towards Eaglehawk the wind took another house by storm, entering by the door and blowing the wall out. Near the Star Reef, a reefer, who was lying in his stretcher, listening to the roar of the wind, and pitying the unfortunates who were not so snug as he in his blankets, was suddenly awakened from

his reverie by finding himself at the mercy of the pelting rain and furious blast.' Luckily he recovered his property, but bad to seek friendly shelter for the night.