E-text prepared by the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 25970-h.htm or 25970-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/5/9/7/25970/25970-h/25970-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/5/9/7/25970/25970-h.zip) A FULL DESCRIPTION OF THE GREAT TORNADO IN CHESTER COUNTY, PA. by RICHARD DARLINGTON, Jr., Principal of "Ercildoun Seminary." West Chester, Pa.: F. S. Hickman, Printer & Publisher. 1877. The unprecedented destruction of property by the tornado which passed through the western part of our county on the first of July last, created in the minds of many a desire to have a full account of the movement, conduct, and origin of the storm cloud, together with such scientific explanation as would throw some light upon this remarkable phenomenon. After some weeks had elapsed, I gave the subject considerable attention, and have prepared this pamphlet, which I trust will meet some of the wants of intelligent inquirers upon this subject, and will also be the means of enabling the people to have a better knowledge of the loss sustained by those living along the route of the storm. This account has been prepared at the suggestion of a number who are interested in the subject. R. D. _West Chester, Aug. 15, 1877._ THE GREAT TORNADO. The Summer of 1877 has been remarkable in some localities for the severity of its storms. These, in several instances, have partaken of the character of tornadoes. Mt. Carmel, in Illinois, was nearly destroyed about the 20th of June last; Pensaukee, in Wisconsin, was nearly ruined on the 8th of July, and Pittston, in Massachusetts, suffered terribly from a tornado on the same day. While these great moving storm-clouds occur occasionally in some of the Southern States, they generally move through sparsely settled districts, and the damage inflicted excites but little attention elsewhere. In the West Indies, and in other tropical regions, these tornadoes are of frequent occurrence, and the damage is often fearful, whole towns being completely swept away. In the East Indies, and on the coast of India, these storms are known as Cyclones, because of their rotary motion--the Greek word _Ruklos_, from which "Cyclone" is derived, meaning "_a whirl_". A cyclone frequently extends across a great belt, and is from fifty to five hundred miles in width. It may last for hours, and if it occurs on the ocean it destroys most of the vessels within its reach. In the dreadful hurricane that fell upon Coringa, in India, in 1839, the town was destroyed and twenty thousand people lost their lives.