UK Weather - past and present
Month of July
Thunderstorms 8th July, 1810
The thunderstorm, which was felt so severely in the metropolis, yesterday, extended to Sheffield and its neighbourhood, where it appears to have done considerable damage. The lightning struck the houses of Mr. Carr, and Mr. Thomson, in the Ponds; demolishing the windows, looking-glasses, picture-frames, and cupboards in its course, and with a tremendous explosion rocking the buildings to their foundations. Though it passed through the bed-chambers where the families lay, providentially no person was hurt. Attercliffe chapel was likewise struck by a flash, which entered at the belfrey, tore the roof, shattered several windows, dislocated stones, split the board on which the commandments are written, and made its way through the north-east window of the gallery, which it burst to pieces, and drove out the frame. In a field near Broomhall, a horse was killed during the storm: and a house at Rotherham was much damaged by the lightning.
Thunderstorms in Sheffield 28th July, 1829
On Friday night this town and neighbourhood was visited with an awful storm of thunder and lightning. The thunder was not so loud, nor the lightning so vivid, as we have before noticed, but the frequency and duration of the flashes were greater and more appalling than we have seen for several years past. Although we have not heard of much damage occasioned by the electric fluid, we lament to state that a lamentable accident has occurred which is attributable to a collateral effect of this visitation. At a late hour of the night in question, a man named Green, who keeps the Cornish Inn near the river Don, took a boat which belongs to the house (and which, it seems, is kept for aquatic amusements), for the purpose of kindly ferrying a female, who had gone into his house for shelter, over from the public-house to Neepsend, no great distance up the river. The woman having stepped on the bank, and while two men were waiting to be taken back, Green perceived that there was a sudden and violent swell of the river, and being unable to get out of the boat, or to fasten it, was carried with great force down the water, crying out for help, which, however, from impediments on the margin of the river could not be rendered. It is said that he maintained his situation in the boat till he came near the Wicker tilt, and that some person on the Ladies'-bridge heard him shriek frightfully, and on looking over the battlement wall saw him (by the aid of a flash of lightning) dash over the weir, after which he was not seen or heard of more. The boat has since been picked up near Tinsley, but the body of the unfortunate man, is undoubtedly drowned, had not been found up to last night. He has left a wife and 5 children to lament his loss. The swell of that portion of the Don is attributed to what is commonly called the bursting of a cloud somewhere in the neighbourhood of Bradfield, where a bridge and a great quantity of sand have been washed away.
Source:Sheffield Iris July 28
Low temperature, 31st July, 1840
Low temperature of July. At the latter part of the month of April, the thermometer ranged in the sun between 96 and 114 degrees. Since the first day of July, although the sun is at a much greater altitude, the range was between 69 and 87 degrees.
Weather Report for 1st July, 1865
Floods bursts River Banks, 3rd July, 1958
HOMES EVACUATED IN SHEFFIELD
ROADS BLOCKED IN MANY COUNTIES
Roads in many counties were still affected last night by yesterday's floods, which caused damage in a wide belt of country stretching southwards from Sheffield to Southend. Many places had over 11/2in. of rain in 12 hours. In the Sheffield area, where conditions were said to be the worst since the bursting of the Dale Dyke reservoir in 1864, hundreds of people were evacuated early yesterday from their houses after river banks had collapsed. A cloudburst over the moors on the city's south side sent the usually placid little River Sheaf surging down the valley from Totley. The banks burst in several places, causing flooding in Millhouses, Abbeydale, Heeley, and Lowfields. The swollen Sheaf then joined the River Don near the Midland Station. Thousands of houses were flooded - some cottages to a depth of 5ft - roads became rivers, two bridges were demolished and motor cars were swept away. A trail of damage six miles long was left.
HOUSE FALLS - Just before a terrace house in Yarborough Road collapsed into the river, workmen shouted to the tenant, Mrs. Evelyn Rowlands, aged 83, to get out. Her son, who lives next door, rescued his mother, who is an invalid. Sheffield W.V.S. workers set up a rest centre where 35 people evacuated from their homes were accommodated. Mobile canteens provided hot meals for people whose homes had been flooded. Army personnel helped to evacuate tenants stranded in old people's bungalows near the river Dearne at Darfield in the West Riding.
8FT. ABOVE NORMAL - The river Don at Rotherham was at one time more than 8ft. above normal and 18in. above danger level.
Floods Families leave by boat 4th July, 1958
CHILD SWEPT AWAY BY RIVER - Thirty families were evacuated in boats yesterday from the upstairs rooms of their flooded homes at Catcliffe, near Rotherham, Yorkshire. They were marooned in the bedrooms of their houses in Orgreave Road and Sheffield Lane when the River Rother overflowed its banks and flooded a large area. In parts the floods were 8ft.deep and most of the houses had 5ft. of water in the downstairs rooms. The River Don at Rotherham was 9ft. above normal - a foot higher than on Wednesday and 21/2ft. above the danger level. The railway line between Rotherham and Mexborough was out of operation because of 4ft.deep floods near Rotherham central station. The occupants of hundreds of houses in the mining village of Bentley, near Doncaster, were warned by loud-speaker van yesterday to be prepared to leave or to move to bedroom level as many did in the floods of 1947.
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