528 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1748. 



Of the Storm of Thunder, which happened June 12, 1748. By the Rev. Henry 

 Miles, D.D., F.R.S. N° 488, p. 383. 



The preceding day had been remarkably hot, and in the afternoon veiy cloudy, 

 with the usual indications of an approaching storm in the evening. At 1 next 

 morning, a person apprehensive of the thunder, looking out at his window, was 

 surprised to find an unusual clear sky, every where equal to what is observed in 

 frosty weather, or after a high wind, except that in a few places were some thun 

 der-clouds just above the horizon. 



At 2 we heard thunder at a distance : at half past 3 Dr. M. perceived the 

 storm approaching apace from the south, where the wind then was, but the 

 darker clouds seemed to bear off chiefly to the east and west. At 4 fell a smart 

 shower of rain, and about 5, 2 loud claps of thunder over our heads, but pretty 

 high ; the lightning was very pale, and the flashes large, descending in a spiral 

 form, almost perpendicular to the horizon to the eastward, which is the situation 

 of Stretham, and at about 2 miles distant from him. His barometers conti- 

 nued successively rising and falling during the storm, but very inconsiderably. 



Hearing that 2 houses were damaged, situate at the foot of the hill on which 

 the mineral wells are, fronting the east, by the wood side, he went next day to 

 view them. The house to the south, which is a public house kept by Mr. How- 

 ard, seemed to have received the greatest shock. Some of the family being up, 

 the front door stood partly open, when the storm began : the upper half was of 

 glass, framed like a sish window, having 2 sliding shutters, one on each side, 

 which had not been taken down. The glass between them was shattered to 

 pieces, but the shutters no ways touched, except that a nail in one of them was 

 forced in a little way. To the door-post, on the left hand, hung by an iron piri 

 an iron bar, which served to fasten the door at night: this pin was driven out of 

 the post, and the bar considerably bent, and in divers places melted in small 

 spots, as were the hinges of the door, chiefly on the edges in both, and the 

 door-post split. A sheet of lead on the pediment, or shelter over the door, was 

 raised, and partly rolled up at one comer ; the cornice underneath being torn off 

 without being split, a good part of the tiling near the eaves and over the pedi- 

 ment was loosened, and some tiles beaten off", and the lathing, and some of the 

 mouldings of the windows had taken fire. 



In a bed-chamber fronting the road, on the 2d floor, where Mr. Howard lay, 

 3 boards of the lining of the room, on the east side, were driven inwards 5 or 6 

 inches at one end; but at the other the nails were a little loosened only. In a 

 garret over this chamber, the upper part of a bed-post was shivered; and nearly 

 over where this bed stood, a large hole was broken in the roof, on the west side, 

 just by where one of the chimneys goes up ; the chimneys having all additional 



