Towards the middle of July and the month of August some parts of this coast are subject to tornadoes. We had one of them on the 25th of July, which obliged us, although lying at anchor in a river, to let go a second. The previous day and that morning had been extremely close and sultry. The storm came on from the north-west, with the greatest violence, accompanied by a few claps of thunder and vivid flashes of lightning: such was its force that, although in smooth water, the ship heeled so much over that our main-deck guns nearly touched the water; and a fine schooner of seventy tons burthen, tender to the _Severn_, with a long 18-pounder on board, at anchor near us, without topmasts, her sails furled and gaffs on deck, was turned bottom upwards in a moment, and one poor fellow drowned. Its fury was spent in about ten minutes, but during its continuance we saw immense trees torn up by the roots, barns blown down like card houses of children, and where the strength of the current of wind passed scarcely anything could withstand its violence. Trees and other things continued to be swept by us for sometime, and when the tornado was over we observed, at a turn of the river, so much large timber, lumber, and other articles floating down the tide that my gallant senior officer, Captain Nourse, who is since dead, poor fellow! thought at first it was the American flotilla coming to attack us, and he was just on the point of returning to his ship to prepare for a fight, he having come on board to dine with me, when I discovered, by means of a spy-glass, the approaching flotilla was perfectly harmless. This circumstance was mentioned a short time afterwards to that _most gallant_ officer, Captain Napier, who commanded the _Euryalus_, but Charley would not believe that the force of wind could upset a schooner of seventy tons, lying at anchor with all her sails furled, with her gaffs on deck, and without even top-masts; however, on the dashing, brilliant expedition, under Sir James Gordon, up the Potomac to Alexandria, above Washington, he had an opportunity of judging for himself when (part of a tornado passing across the bows of the frigate) he saw in a moment both his bowsprit and fore-topmast broken in two, like twigs. Having heard that the enemy’s gun boats had moved down from Nottingham towards Benedict, on the 10th August I was ordered to proceed twenty miles up the river with five boats to reconnoitre. On landing I was informed they had been there two days before, but that they had returned to Upper Marlborough. On rowing up the river we fell in with a canoe, containing one white man, who was pulling from Leonard creek to the opposite shore; on seeing us he endeavoured to get to land, but not being able to do so, jumped overboard and was drowned. We had every reason to believe he was one of our deserters.