2 WILLIAM T. BRIGIIAJM 



Eighteen years after the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth they felt the first earth- 

 quake most of them had ever experienced. In Bradford's History is the following 

 account : ^ 



"This year (1638) aboute y* 1. or 2. of June was a great & fearfull earthquake; it was in this place heard 

 before it was felte. It came witli a rumbling noyse, or low murmure like unto reraoate thunder: it came from 

 y' norward, & pased southward. As y* noyse aproched nerer, the earth begane to shake and came at 

 leno-th with that violence as caused platters, dishes, & such like things as stoode upon shelves, to clatter and 

 fall downe ; yea persons were afraid of y'' houses them selves. It so fell oute y' at y= same time diverse of 

 y= cheefe of this towne were mett together at one house, conferring with some of their friends that were 

 upon their removall from y" place, (as if y' Lord would herby show y' signs of his displeasure, in their shak- 

 ing a peeces & removalls one from an other.) However it was very terrible for y" time, and as y' men were 

 set talkino- in y'' house, some women & others were without y" doors, and y' earth shooke with y' violence 

 as they could not stand without catching hould of y= posts & pails y' stood next them ; but y" violence lasted 

 not lono-. And about halfe an hower, or less, came an other noyse & shaking, but nether so loud nor strong 

 as y" former, but quickly passed over, and so it ceased. It was not only on y" seacoast, but y= Indeans felt it 

 within land ; and some shi]« that were upon y'= coast were shaken by it. So poweifull is y= mighty hand of 

 y'' Lord, as to make both the earth & sea to shake, and the niountaines to tremble before him when he 

 pleases ; and who can stay his haml ? It was observed that y' somers, for divers yeares togeather after this 

 earthquake were not so hot & seasonable for y" ripning of corne & other fruits as formerly; but more coidd 

 & moyst, & subject to erly & untimely frosts, by which, many times, much Indean corne came not to matu- 

 ritie ; but whether this was any cause, I leave it to naturallists to judge." 



Johnson, in his " Wonder-working Providence of Sion's Saviour in New England,"^ 

 describes the event as follows, and it will be noticed that his account adds several particu- 

 lars to that of Bradford : 



" This yeare, the first day of the Fourth Month, about two of the clock in the afternoone, the Lord eaus'd 

 a great and terrible Earthquake, which was general throughout all the English Plantations; the motion of the 

 earth was such, that it caused divers men (that had never known an Earthquake before) being at work in the 

 Fields, to cast downe their working tooles, and run with gastly, terrified lookes, to the next company they 

 could meet withaU ; it came from the Westerne and uninhabited parts of this Wildernesse, and went the 

 direct course." 



Winthrop^ fixes the time of day a little later and gives some vivid details. He says : 

 " Between three and four in the afternoon, being clear, warm weather, the wind westerly, 

 there was a great earthquake. It eame with a noise like a continued thunder, or the 

 rattling of coaches in London, but was presently gone. It was at Connecticut, at Narra- 

 gansett, at Pascataquack, and all the parts round about. It shook the ships which rode 

 in the harbor, and all the islands. The noise and the shakings continued about four 

 minutes. The earth was unquiet twenty days after by times.'.' Had there been observers 

 farther to the north and west we might have learned more of the extent of territory 

 shaken and the direction of the vibrations ; but so little interest did natural phenomena 

 excite in those days — unless indeed they could be connected with some poor witch, or 

 used as weapons by the belligerent clergy, — that the scanty records remaining do not 

 give much information of any value. One historian says the vibration seemed to come 

 from the north, another from the west. There w-ere two shocks, and the paroxysm ended 

 in a series of feeble vibrations extending over twenty days. 



1 Page 366, Edition of the Massachusetts Historical So- ^ Chap. xir. Chap, v, p. 107, Poole's Edition. 



g;gty_ ' Vol. I, p. 265, Savage's Edition. 



