From the Royal Cornwall Gazette, Friday 21st December 1860, page 4.
About eight o’clock on Wednesday morning last, Truro and its neighbourhood were visited by one of the most severe thunder-storms that has been known here for many years. Although in day-light, the flashes of lightning were fearfully vivid; and the closely-following peals of thunder were appalling in effect; the storm seemed to be almost immediately over the town. Commencing shortly before 8 o’clock, it lasted about half an hour; its close being marked by two lightning flashes and thunder claps exceeding in vividness and power any of the preceding ones; and they were immediately followed by a heavy fall of hail and sleet. We regret that the electric fluid proved fatal to a poor woman of Trevaster, about 2 miles from Truro, and in the parish of Kea, on the western bank of the river. She was of middle age, the wife of a labourer named Jewell, who worked for Mr. Richard Magor, at Trethowal, and lived at Trevaster, a farm adjoining Trethowal, and also in the occupation of Mr. Magor. Mrs. Jewell, it appears, left Trethowal alone, about 8 o’clock, to walk to her home at Trevaster, and passing through a pathway field—a wheaten arish— she was instantaneously struck dead by a lightning flash. No person witnessed the accident; but, shortly before 9 o’clock, a young labourer named Henry May, going from Trevaster to Trethowal to work, saw the poor woman lying near the pathway dead. He went to Trethowal and gave information to Mr. Magor and to her husband; and these, with some labourers went to the spot; and the lamentations of the husband being heard across the river, a man named Dyer—a boatbuilder working at Sunny Corner—took a boat and rowed across to the site of the fearful accident; and the body was removed to the deceased’s late home at Trevaster. Further particulars of the accident, and of the appearances of the body and clothing of the deceased will be found in our Report, in another column, of the inquest held on the body by Mr. J. Carlyon. We may add that besides a sorrowing husband, three children bewail the awfully sudden loss of their mother.
Damage to Kenwyn Church.—We regret to say that the storm caused serious damage to the picturesquely situated and fine old church belonging to the parish of Kenwyn. While the storm was at its height, one of the most terrific of the flashes of lightning struck the south-west pinnacle of the tower, on which was the weather-vane, shivering it to atoms, and scattering the large blocks of granite of which it was composed in all directions on to the roof of the church, and around it, for considerable distances. The electric fluid appears to have first struck the flagstaff in the centre of the tower, the truck of which it shattered, and then to have been attracted to the vane which is composed of copper, and descending to the bottom of this, through the two massive blocks of granite in which it was embedded, to have theen exploded with a force something like what would be produced had a shell burst, or the pinnacle been undermined with gunpowder and fired. The report was awful, and the shock of the explosion was distinctly felt in the vicarage adjoining. On hastening to the spot the damage done by the explosion was found to be considerable. Inside the church, it was found that four large blocks of granite, one of which must weigh upwards of 200 lbs. had fallen on the western end in as many places, smashing through the roof, and destroying three of the pews underneath. A fifth had descended upon the roof of the north transept, making an immense hole in it, and falling within a foot of the pulpit. The latter, however, was fortunately uninjured. On ascending to the top of the tower it was found that pieces of granite had burst in the roof in three or four places, and injured it to such an extent as to render a new roof necessary.—Outside the building the effects of the explosion appeared to be, if anything, more extraordinary. Several of the pieces of granite had evidently been broken by its force, and along with whole blocks, projected in various directions around. One of these had been tossed from the pinnacle on to the top of the tower at the western end of the church, to twenty feet beyond the eastern end, and some idea of its weight may be formed when it is stated that it sunk five or six inches into the earth. Another block was thrown twenty yards in the opposite direction, and lighting on the tomb to the memory of the late Mr. and Mrs. Robins, shattered it to fragments. Another piece was thrown a little further to westward, and striking in its descent a thick branch or rather limb of a tree, broke it. One of these fell upon the roof of the kitchen of the cottage adjoining the churchyard, which it of course broke through. Another was pitched close to the gravel walk near the gate opening into the churchyard, a distance of at least 120 feet from the tower, whilst a third was thrown upon the roof of Mr. Hall’s bullock house, at least 50 or 60 feet further, which it broke through, though fortunately without injuring any of the animals inside. The top of the pinnacle was found lying at the foot of the tower, with the vane attached to it. The stone was discoloured and blackened, as if it had been subjected to the blast of a furnace, and the vane was very much bent and crushed. It is providential that the explosion did not occur during the performance of Divine service. Had it happened then, the consequences might have been fearful.
A similar article appeared in the West Briton, Friday December 21st 1860 page 5.
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