24 
PROF. MELDOLA—THE EARTHQUAKE 
that there have been only about six earthquakes in this country since 
the twelfth century which can compare in intensity with the recent 
Essex earthquake. These are as follows:—One in April, 1185, 
recorded by a great many chroniclers, as affecting all England, hut 
especially Lincoln, where the cathedral and many other buildings 
were thrown down. Holinshed speaks of this one as “a sore earth¬ 
quake .... such a one as the like had not been heard of in England 
since the beginning of the world.” One in 1246, which did a great 
deal of damage in Kent, where several churches are said to have 
been “ overturned.” One in 1248, in the West of England, when 
part of the tower of Wells Cathedral is said to have been thrown 
down, the Cathedral of St. David’s partially destroyed, and many 
churches in Somersetshire damaged. One in 1275, also in the 
West of England, when many churches are said to have been thrown 
down, amongst them being St. Michael’s, Glastonbury. One 
in 1382, felt in England, France, Brabant, and Flanders; most 
violent in England, where several churches are said to have been 
thrown down in the south-eastern parts. The remaining one, which 
was felt in Norwich and almost the whole of England, was in 1480, 
when it is said that many buildings were thrown down and that 
much damage was done. 
Among the earthquakes recorded in the report is one on the 19th 
of March, 1750, which is stated to have been felt, among other 
places, at Cheshunt, Hertford, and Ware. It is thus recorded; 
“Several successive shocks; loud noise like thunder or passing 
waggon; hells rung in church steeples; chimneys thrown down 
and houses damaged in London; ‘ great stones fell from the new 
spire of Westminster Abbey.’ ” 
The intensity of an earthquake can best he judged by the 
amount of damage it does ; and it is very strange that although the 
county of Essex can now boast of the most serious earthquake that 
has occurred in Britain for four centuries, it seems hitherto to have 
been remarkably free from them. There are only previous records 
of very slight earthquakes in Essex, and those seem to have been 
merely the vibrations of more serious ones in other parts of the 
country. Among the Essex records it is very interesting to find, 
as we do from the ‘ Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society,’ 
that the great earthquake at Lisbon, in 1755, which caused such 
tremendous destruction of life, and which threw the water in ponds, 
etc., into a state of agitation nearly all over this country, was noticed 
at Rochford. The record is headed “Agitation of water in Rochford, 
Essex, Nov. 1, 1755,” and is contained in a letter from the Rev. 
Mr. Tomlinson to the Rev. Dr. Sykes. This earthquake was also 
noticed in Hertfordshire. In a paper read before the Royal Society, 
the Rev. Thomas Rutherford, D.D., E.R.S., described the oscillation 
of the water in a pond at Patmer Hall, in the parish of Albury, 
“on the first of November [1755], between ten and eleven o’clock 
in the forenoon,” and stated that it was accompanied by “a 
rumbling noise, like the wind.” Dr. Rutherford adds that at 
Wickham Hall, in the parish of Bishop Stortford, “ a pond was 
