A Blizzard in England.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 8776, 11 March 1897, Page 2

A Blizzard in England.

On January 23rd and 24th a combined gale and snowstorm struck the south east of England, and occasioned great suffering and inconvenience and some loss of life. A newspaper of the 25th says :—From all parts of the country reports continue to come in of disasters in the late gale and snow-storm. There has been considerable loss of life, the most serious case on land being at Leicester, where three boys were drowned

through sliding on thin ice. A young married woman was caught on a country road by the snow storm, and being unable to make head against it, died from exhaustion. Near Dunstable an old woman was found dead in a deep drift. In Bedfordshire a postman was dugout of a drift in which he had been buried for some hours. On several roads in Kent mail carts were unable to travel, and rural bus services had to be suspended. Several morning trains in the eastern counties were prevented from running. The driver of a morning passenger train from Dunstable to Linton endeavoured to cat his way through the snow, but the engine and coaches became embedded in the drift. Other engines were brought into requisition and these became similarly fixed. Subsequently breakdown appliances and 100 men from King’s-cross arrived on the scene, and though strenuous efforts were made to

get through the block this was not accomplished until late in the day. A goods train got off the rails at Thorney. After some delay it was started again with two engines. Two miles further on it ran into another snow drift and had to return. The snowfall at Brighton was the heaviest for years, and all through the Thames Valley the storm was very severe. There were many wrecks on theeast coast. Intense cold made the work of rescue so much the more difficult that many lives were lost that in ordinary temperatures would have been saved. A good deal of damage was done by the waves to properties on the shores. At Sheringham a new wing of an hotel on the cliff collapsed by the undermining and fall of the cliff. At South Lowestoft great masses of cliff were swept away and residences on the top were placed in jeopardy, and an undercliff walk was destroyed. At the same time a very severe blizzard raged in the United States, over Kansas, lowa, Nebraska and Minnesota. Most of the railways and roads were blocked, many animals and some human beings perished. The thermometer sank to to 20 degrees below zero.