The Great Comanche Iowa tornado of 1860

[Joel Wright]

Many of you guys may not have heard of this infamous long-track tornado that ravaged the landscape on a balmy afternoon on June 3, 1860. It's path is nearly as long as the Great Tri-state tornado of 1925. This tornado killed 141 people, and injured another 350 (although it's stated that many others died later from their injuries bringing death totals to near 200). This is all according to John L. Stanford's Tornado Accounts of Tornadoes in Iowa 2nd Edition.

The storm had formed somewhere in northwest Iowa in the early afternoon, and dropped damaging hail in Calhoun and Webster counties.

The tornado started in Hamilton county Iowa, (or about 60 miles north of Des Moines) and traveled just south of due east deep into northern Illinois as far east as Amboy where it finally lifted around 9pm. So the tornado could have been on the ground for well over 6hrs. The town most directly hit was Comanche Iowa, where over 50 people were killed. Nearly the whole town was wiped off the map by the tornado that was reported to be 1/2 mile wide at this time.

Much of Iowa is farmland even to this day, but 150 years ago population was even more sparce. One can only speculate how damaging the tornado would have been if it would have hit more highly populate areas.

It's a bit frustrating that there isn't very much information available about this tornado. I'd love to see some case studies on it.

After reading through all the great new information about the Great Tri-State Tornado, I was reminded of this one and it made me wish there was more information revealing some details yet uncovered.

 

[rdale]

How would you even begin to do a thorough study of this event? At least there was some network of national obs to help with the Tri-State tornado, but nothing even remotely approaching that was available in the mid-1800's...

 

[Jeremy Ludin]

I would like to know more on this too. Even though it WAS in the 1800's, more information would be great to read up on. It's just amazing to know that those people had ZERO warning. Nowadays one would know days in advance of a "high risk" day. Being so close to home it intrigues me to think that we could actually see something like that again in our lifetime.

 

[Joel Wright]

How would you even begin to do a thorough study of this event? At least there was some network of national obs to help with the Tri-State tornado, but nothing even remotely approaching that was available in the mid-1800's...

Exactly. That's what's frustrating. For a case study you want as much information as possible. With this event there just isn't anything more than a handful of a personal accounts and the hard statistics.

One interesting story I forgot to mention in the above post was about a family traveling west across eastern Iowa that afternoon. They were traveling west in a covered wagon across Clinton county Iowa when they encountered the tornado. They apparently had $7,000 worth of gold coins. No doubt intended to help jumpstart their new lives.

The tornado killed everyone in the family except one little girl. The gold coins were scattered all over a portion of the county as the strong tornado blew through. $3,000 of the coins were recovered over the coming weeks by some lucky survivors of the storm.

To this day, nearly $4,000 worth of gold coins lie beneath the soil somewhere in that area of Clinton county. Much of it was probably plowed deep beneath the fertil soil by farm equipment over the years. A very interesting story indeed.

This is known around here as The Legend of Low Moor. Low Moor is the town in Clinton county Iowa where that family encountered the tornado.

 

[Joel Wright]

For those of you who may be interested, this is a rough look at what the path looked like. It was said there may have been two tornadoes on the ground simultaneously near the Cedar Rapids area. One that passed north of town, and one that passed south. The south one would be represented on this map of course.

Comanche Iowa is the red star near the Mississippi River...

 

[Sam Shamburger]

There's a considerable writeup about the 1860 Comanche, Iowa tornado family in Significant Tornadoes by Tom Grazulis.

 

[afischer]

Wow, very interesting.

One thing that jumps out at me about this tornado family is its path. Typically, extremely long-track tornadoes and/or long-lived tornado families seem to most commonly move between NNE and E. This one looked to move roughly ESE.

Granted, westerly and even northwesterly flow can certainly produce cyclic tornadic supercells (especially across ND, SD, NE, and MN; in fact, my mother survived one on July 3, 1947)... but it's rare that ESE- or SE-bound storms are able to drop big league tornadoes for 5 hours straight.

 

[Mike McDonald]

A description of the tornado's path across Iowa is described in the 1879 history of Clinton County, Iowa where Camanche (as spelled in the book), is located. The book has been transcribed as is available on the Internet. The chapter on the tornado is here:
http://users.rootsweb.com/~iaclinto/history/1879/pages/395.htm

Be forewarned, the book is written in mid-19th century prose, and the transcription is lacking paragraphs. From the chapter:

"Sunday, the 3d day of June, A. D. 1860, will long be remembered in the annals not only of Iowa, but of the Northwest, as the day of the most tremendous tornado on record, rivaling the cyclones of the Indian Ocean, the hurricanes of the West Indies and the typhoons of the China seas, in the distance that it swept, from Central Iowa, to the interior of Michigan, and surpassing most tropical storms in the force of the wind. Nothing like it had been supposed possible in Northern latitudes."

"The air was loaded with fragments of wrecked buildings and branches of large trees, and darkened with dust and earth. Cloud flakes and spume were whirled from the sides of the atmospheric maelstrom, and its deafening roar as it swept over the champaign. a gloomy column, with a lurid red core glowing angrily through its murky envelope, it could be compared to nothing else than the chariot of the Omnipotent as pictured by Milton in 'Paradise Lost.'"

Despite sentences like this, there are some more practical descriptions of the tornado, its path and the damage.

From rdale:

How would you even begin to do a thorough study of this event? At least there was some network of national obs to help with the Tri-State tornado, but nothing even remotely approaching that was available in the mid-1800's...

Interesting point, not lost on the author. From the chapter:

"To the meteorologist who reviews the history of this remarkable phenomenon, it is a matter of great regret that Government signal stations and weather reports had not then been established, so that science could have been advanced by observation of the barometric and electric phenomena that must have coincided with the development of such a terrific meteor."

Mike

 

[Joel Wright]

Wow, that was a very interesting read. Thanks for digging that up Mike. That storm truly sounds like it was very incredible.

I thought this was quite disturbing...

"Among the wrecks it left were the head of an infant and the arms and legs of a grown person brought from many miles westward. Three persons were taken up bodily and vanished forever from mortal eyes."

 

[Joel Wright]

Here's an eyewitness account written by Benjamin F. Gue, who later became Lieutenant Governor and historian of Iowa. He was 31 years old at the time and was farming near Cedar Rapids, near the town of Mt. Vernon. He observed the tornado passing within a half mile from his farm house.

This is out of John L. Stanford's book Tornado Accounts of Tornadoes in Iowa 2nd Edition.

"We could now faintly hear long continued rumble of thunder and for some time sharp tongues of lightning had been visible. The atmosphere, the haze and the rising bank of clouds had a weird unnatural appearance and the oppressiveness of the lifeless heat became almost unbearable. It was now noticed for the first time that the light-colored upper clouds, which resembled the dense smoke of a great prairie fire, were rapidly moving from the north and south toward the center of the storm cloud, and, as they met, were vilently agitated like boiling water descending in a rapid movement to the black cloud below. We were all now intently watching this strange movement, something we had never before seen, when the thought flashed across my mind-this is a tornado! The clouds had now been in sight about three-quarters of an hour and the vivid flashing of the lightning and steady roar of the thunder were continuous.

The wind came in gusts from the east, changing to the south, and again suddenly veering to the north, then dying away into a dead calm. The cloud was now rising rapidly and trailing below it seemed to be an immense funnel, the lower end of which appeared to be dragging on the ground. We could hear a steady roar, very heavy but not loud, like an immense freight train crossing a bridge. Looking toward a grove some three miles distant in the path of the black trailing cloud we saw high up in the air great trees, torn and shattered, thrown by the force of the whirlwind outside of its vortex and falling toward the earth. My family had gone into the cellar, which was of large rocks, upon which rested the balloon frame house. I stood close by the outside doorway, ready to spring in if the fearful black swaying trail should come toward the house. It appeared to be passing about half a mile north of us. The sight, while grand and fearful, was too fascinating to be lost unless the danger became imminent. The roar was now awful, and a terrific wind was blowing directly toward the swaying, twisting black trail, which seemed to be sweeping down into the ground. It was coming directly toward the log house of my nearest neighbor on the north, and I saw the family run out and down a steep bluff on Rock Creek and cling to the willows. Suddenly the funnel rose into the air and I could see falling to the earth, tree tops, rails, boards, posts and every conceivable broken fragment of wrecked buildings. We watched the angry clouds as they swept by toward the east. It was an awe-inspiring sight. The whirlwind column which had so suddenly risen from the earth seemed absorbed and lost in the rolling, tumbling, mass of clouds that overshadowed the eastern sky. The sight was appalling as the cloud of inky blackness settled down to the earth again in the distance, sweeping on with a mighty power, glowing with a thousand forked tongues of lightning as the very earth seemed to tremble beneath the incessant roar of thunder. No pen or tongue can convey to the mind a true picture of the frightful sights and sounds that lurked in the rear of that irresistible tornado as it was then gathering greater power of destruction to overwhelm and crush the town of Comanche."

 

[Josh Richardson]

Very interesting thread as I didnt recall ever hearing about this tornado previously. I do know the area that your speaking of in Clinton Co. as well, as my fiance's family lives in Clinton. One question though, how are we to know that it is even 1 tornado on the ground the entire time? Being that we are talking about the 1800's I dont believe there is anyway to know that and I believe these are the things Mr. Dale is referencing to in his post.

"How would you even begin to do a thorough study of this event? At least there was some network of national obs to help with the Tri-State tornado, but nothing even remotely approaching that was available in the mid-1800's..."

 

[afischer]

Very interesting thread as I didnt recall ever hearing about this tornado previously. I do know the area that your speaking of in Clinton Co. as well, as my fiance's family lives in Clinton. One question though, how are we to know that it is even 1 tornado on the ground the entire time?

Grazulis describes it as "a complex family of tornadoes moving ESE and E on roughly parallel tracks and in at least one case pausing to merge into a single tornado."

Meaning, of course, that it was probably cyclic... if i'm interpreting it right.

 

[Josh Richardson]

BTW, according to the story Mike linked here the tornado, or at least a different tornado, started in Hardin Co. which is two counties to the south of me in the New Providence area.

 

[Jesse Risley]

"How would you even begin to do a thorough study of this event? At least there was some network of national obs to help with the Tri-State tornado, but nothing even remotely approaching that was available in the mid-1800's..."

I would say that you could start with local libraries and historical societies. Check local newspapers and other periodicals from that time period...something could have been preserved and transferred onto microfilm. You might even be suprised what you could find in diaries that have been passed down through generations. At this point in time that would be all that you could hope for, especially since insurance agency records would probably be long gone.

These are the types of events that often turn up some of the best information from primary source (original) artifacts that have been passed down within familes or organizations for generations.

At the time of the tornado (pre-NWS) in 1860, the invention of the telegraph had already allowed some semblance of a nationwide weather observation network. The Smithsonian was collecting weather data, along with private entities and some newspapers. The military was also taking keen note of weather patterns, although I'm not sure what Iowa or NW Illinois would have been doing for formal or informal weather observations at that time. It would be interesting to delve into some of these old records and see what one could find.

 

[Josh Richardson]

I would say that you could start with local libraries and historical societies. Check local newspapers and other periodicals from that time period...something could have been preserved and transferred onto microfilm. You might even be suprised what you could find in diaries that have been passed down through generations. At this point in time that would be all that you could hope for, especially since insurance agency records would probably be long gone.

These are the types of events that often turn up some of the best information from primary source (original) artifacts that have been passed down within familes or organizations for generations.

BTW, that was RDale's quote, not mine. I had referenced it in my post to state that I agree with him.