Tectonic events like a 5.8 earthquake in California and a volcano eruption in Washington caught our attention. But they failed to match the December 1811-February 1812 New Madrid earthquakes that caused the mighty Mississippi River to briefly recede.
Consider the eyewitness statement of Firmin La Roche, a French fur trader from St. Louis.
The border west of the Mississippi had been sold by France to the United States only eight years before the earthquake. Missouri was a territory, not yet a state.
LaRoche’s account, preserved in the archives of the Missouri Historical Review, was written in New Orleans on February 2. October 20, 1812, when aftershocks were still frequent. He had just completed a disastrous voyage that began with three flat boats:
sounds like thunder
“I was present at the earthquake that recently occurred above and below the mouth of the Ohio River, along both banks of the Mississippi River.
“I was taking three boats to New Orleans with some furs bought in St. Louis. On the night of December 15, we docked eight miles north of New Madrid near the home of my cousin, John LeClerq.
“There was with me Fr. Joseph of the Osage Mission, returning to France — also Jaques Menier, Dominic Berges, Leon Sarpy, Henry Lamel, five other men and the black slave, Ben, who was murdered in New Madrid.
“After dinner we went to sleep. I was woken by a crash like thunder. The boat turned on its side and Lamel, who was sleeping next to it, fell on top of me. We fell against the side. It was very dark.
“We left the bank in about half an hour, and I looked at my watch. It was 3 o’clock. I could see trees on the bank falling. Large masses of land fell into the river.”
“Lamel cut the rope that tied us to a log. In a moment, a wave so great came up the river that I never saw one like it at sea. It carried us back north, upriver, for more than a mile. The water spread over the banks, covering three or four miles inland.
“It was a receding current. Then this wave stopped and slowly the river went back to the right.”
“Everywhere there was a noise like thunder. The ground shook the trees. The air was thick with something like smoke. There was a lot of lightning.
“We thought we would surely die. Father Joseph gave absolution. We did not see either of the other two boats. One of them we never saw again, nor do I know if the men in them drowned. We were all in great terror, waiting for death .
“Trees were downed. People said there were big cracks in the ground, some very deep, extending 10 or 15 miles. “They told us there’s a new lake in Tennessee (Reelfoot) and the waterways have changed . The Yazoo River has a new mouth.
“I was in great pain with a broken arm. Of those with me, there is none other than Father Joseph. My personal loss is $600 (about $12,000 in today’s currency).”
The memory of a priest
In an appendix to La Rouche’s account, Father Joseph stated:
“I think there were two big jolts about a half hour apart and many small ones in between and after. The water rose in such a way that a tree on the bank, the top of which must have been 30 feet above the level of the river, was left fully covered…
“We saw two houses on fire on the left bank. When we arrived in New Madrid, there were also houses burning there.
“We came ashore at dawn, and a hickory tree fell on the boat, killing the black, Ben, and breaking Chief LaRouche’s left arm.
“We did not make any effort to find out how many people had died, although we were told that there were many. We saw several corpses. Later we saw drowned people floating in the river.
“Loads of skins were thrown into the river by the people who crowded into the boat with us until we could take no more.”
Another account
Another eyewitness account (edited here for brevity) was deposited by New Madrid resident Eliza Bryan four years after the event.
“On December 16, 1811, about 2 a.m., we were visited by a violent shaking of an earthquake. It was accompanied by a very frightful noise resembling loud but distant thunder, but more hoarse and vibrating.
“This was followed within a few minutes by the complete saturation of the atmosphere with sulphurous vapour, causing total darkness.
“Truly horrible were the cries of the frightened inhabitants who ran to and fro, not knowing where to go, what to do, the cries of birds and beasts of all kinds, the cracking of falling trees, and the Roar of the Mississippi, which was retrograde for a few minutes.
“The inhabitants fled in all directions, assuming that there was less danger in the distance than near the river.
“There were several minor shocks a day until January 23, 1812. Then there was one as violent as the most severe of the previous ones.
“From that time until February 4, the earth was in continual turmoil, visibly rolling like a smooth sea.
“On February 7, around 4 am, there was a concussion so much more violent than those that had preceded it, that it was called ‘the hard crash.’
“The terrible darkness of the sulphurous vapor-saturated atmosphere, and the violence of the tempestuous thunderous noise, formed a scene beyond imagination.
“At first the Mississippi seemed to recede from its shores: its waters gathered together like a mountain. For a moment many ships bound for New Orleans were left on the bare sand. The poor sailors escaped from them.
“The river then rose 15 to 20 feet perpendicularly and expanded. The banks overflowed with the retrograde current. Boats that had been left on the sand were now torn from their moorings.
“The river, falling as rapidly as it had risen, carried away entire groves of cottonwoods with it. Many fish were left on the banks.
“In all the hard blows, the earth was torn horribly apart. Hundreds of acres were covered by the sand that poured out of the fissures. In some places, there was a substance resembling coal.
“It has lately been discovered that a lake (Reelfoot) formed on the opposite side of the Mississippi in Indian Territory (west Tennessee). It is over 100 miles long, one to six miles wide, and depths from 10 to 50 feet. .
“For eighteen months, we were constrained by the fear that our houses would collapse from the continued impacts, so we lived in small, light camps. Some people fled never to return, but most returned.”
giant earth fault
The US Geological Survey classifies the three major earthquakes in the central Mississippi valley in the winter of 1811-12 as “the most powerful in US history.”
There were no seismographs then. However, the extent of the land changes indicate three closely related earthquakes: magnitudes of 8 or greater on the Richter seismograph scale of ten times points.
The most powerful earthquake on record is the Richter 8.4 for Alaska earthquake of 1964.
USGS says: “Earthquakes in the central United States affect much larger areas than earthquakes of similar magnitude in the western US.
“The 1906 San Francisco, California earthquake (magnitude 7.8) was felt 350 miles away. The first New Madrid earthquake rang church bells in Boston, Massachusetts, a thousand miles away.”
New Madrid in 1811 consisted of 400 log cabins. St. Louis and Memphis were small towns. “If a Category 8 earthquake were to strike today, those cities would be mostly destroyed and thousands of people would die,” the USGS says.
Last year, 470 measurable earthquakes were recorded in the central Mississippi Valley.
USGS Warning: “The probability of a magnitude 6 to 7 earthquake occurring in the New Madrid Seismic Zone within the next 50 years is greater than 90 percent.”
Ask:
Which is worse: hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, wildfires, mudslides, volcanoes, or earthquakes?