Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 7.djvu/213

 EARTHQUAKES IN NEW ENGLAND.

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��March 21, 1736, aljout lialf an hour past ten in the morning, it was some- what loud.

July 13, about 9.45 a. m.. the noise of it was loud.

October i, about 1.30 a. m., it was loud and long, and a great shock re- peated twice in an instant.

November 12, about two in the morning, there was a shock with the noise, and about six the same morning another something louder.

February 6, 1736-7, about a ([uarter past four p. M., there was a considerable shock.

Shocks were also felt in Boston, sa3's Mr. Brigham, at the same hour of Feb- ruary 16. This probably was the same as the above, with a n. s. date.

September 9, 1737, about 10.20 a.m., it was very loud and long, and shook our houses very much.

" In October or November of the same year," says Mr. B., "a very slight shock was felt in Boston, but it is only referred to as happening about seven- teen years before the great earthquake

of 1 755-"

December 7, a little before eleven in

the night, the ground shook very much, but we heard no noise. On the same seventh of December, at New York, they had three severe shocks of an earthijuake in the night ; it threw down there some chimneys, and made the bells to toll so as to be heard. At the same time the said shock and noise was felt and heard in many other places. This is the same shock referred to by Mr. B., page 9, as happening on De- cember 17. His date is n. s., Mr. Plant's o. s.

August 2, 1739, we had a great shock ; it made my house to shake, and the windows jar. It was about an hour past two in the morning. I think I never heard but two other louder or longer or greater.

December 14, 1 740, about 6.35 a. m., there was heard a pretty loud noise of the earthquake.

January 18, 1741, about four a. m, there was heard the noise of the earth- (juake.

��January 25, 1741. about ten minutes before four in the afternoon, there was a shock of the earthquake with a loud rumbling noise.

The above account, up to January 25, 1 741, was copied by Mr. Plant and sent to England, and read before the Philoso])hical Society, February 21, 1742, and published in the Philo- sophical Transactions, vol. 43, p. ^;^.

In the letter transmitting his record, he says : "This is the last that has been heard (and I pray God I may never hear any more such and so long). I have omitted to set down some that were small, or such as I did not hear myself. I was very exact to the time, so that what account I have sent you is most certainly true. .And though the first night was the most terrible, as the surprise was sudden, yet there never happened one shock among us, but what occasioned some alteration at that time in every person's countenance or con- stitution ; and which way soever any person's face happened to be, that way the noise of the earthifuake appeared to him. These frequent repetitions of the roaring and shocks of the earth- quake were upon Merrimack river, and seldom extended above seven or eight miles' distance from, or twenty or thirty up the river — those instances alone ex- cepted which I have mentioned in the relation : and the first shock of it was greater with us than anywhere else in New England ; gjud the tops of chim- neys and stone fences were thrown down in these parts."

Mr. Plant was a nati\-e of England, born in 1691 ; was graduated from Jesus College, Cambridge, in 1712 ; became rector of Queen Anne's Chapel, New- bury, April 29, 1722; died April 2,

1753- The earthcjuake on the Tuesday pre-

cedingSepteml)er 15, 1728 (n.s.), men- tioned by Mr. B. in Historical Notes, is ])robably the same as that mentioned by Mr. Plant as occurring September 8.

The shock of November 9, 1727, mentioned by Mr. B., is doubtless the same as Mr. Plant's of October 29. the one being N. s., the other o. s.

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