"A true report of certaine wonderfull ouerflowings of Waters, now lately in Summerset-shire, Norfolke and other places of England: destroying many thousands of men, women, and children, overthrowing and bearing downe whole townes and villages, and drowning infinite numbers of sheepe and other Cattle"
Originally printed in 1607 for Edward White, reprinted by Ernest E. Baker in 1884 (from which the attached copy was made), including "two excellent facsimiles" produced "by means of one of the many modern systems of reproduction". One of the title page with its "quaint woodcut" and the other of the first page - a "'sample of the antient black letter printing"
It also includes an account of flooding in Norfolk on the same date, as well as accounts of lesser floods at earlier dates to show that "our punishment (is) greater, because our treason against God is more horrible."
"Lamentable newes out of Monmouth-shire in Wales. Contayning, The wonderfull and most fearefull accidents of the great ouerflowing of waters in the saide Countye, drowning infinite numbers of Cattell of all kinds, as Sheepe, Oxen, Kine and horses, with others: together with the losse of many men, women and Children, and the submersion of xxvi Parishes in Ianuary last
Originally printed in 1607 for William Welby, reprinted by Charles Heath in 1829 (from which the attached copy was made), and as a facsimile by Albert A. Williams of Llangibby in 1915,
The title page is clearly copied from the Somerset pamphlet (not vice versa, because it contains quotes from the Somerset one). The first page shows the style of the original.
"Gods Warning to his people of England. Wherein is related his most Wonderfull, and Miraculous workes, by the late overflowing of the Waters, in the Countryes of Sommerset and Gloucester, the Counties of Munmoth, Glamorgan, Carmarthen, and Cardigan, with divers other places in South-wales."
Printed in 1607 by William Jones of Usk. The original is preserved in the Harleian Library, now the Harleian Collection of the British Library. The British Library also hold reprints from 1745 (the Harleian Miscellany vol 3 pp 363-368) and 1809 (Harleian Miscellany vol 3 pp 379-384).
This document (British Library manuscript number 1103.e.62) is shown on this site, with permission from the British Library. The copyright of this document belongs to the British Library and further reproduction is prohibited.
A summary was also reprinted in the Gentleman's Magazine for 1762, p306. The attached page is copied from a website that no longer exists, containing the text of this article. This account is also mentioned in the context of the Berkeley Manuscripts of Thomas Dudley Fosbrooke (1821), and Rev. Beaver H. Blacker's 'Gloucestershire Notes and Queries' pp 379 - 380.
The Lost Chronicle of Barnstaple by Todd Gray (ISBN 0 85214 063 0)
Edited by Dr Todd Gray of Exeter University, this brings together for the first time two different versions of the town chronicle of Barnstaple, written between 1586 and 1611 by the Town Clerk, Adam Wyatt, the original of which has been missing for some two hundred years. An eighteenth century copy of extracts from the lost chronicle has been known about locally since it appeared first in print in the middle of the ninteenth century (wrongly ascribed to Philip Wyatt, an earlier Town Clerk); the handwritten original of this is now housed at the North Devon Record Office (B 12Z/1). Dr Gray has uncovered an earlier, albeit less complete, version of the chronicle in the Somerset Record Office, thought to have been compiled by Jonathan Hanmer, the Puritan minister of Bishop's Tawton who was ejected from his living in 1662, probably about the time that the copy was made. This new book includes the complete text of both versions, a substantial, informative introduction and an index of names and places. It is published by the Devonshire Association and costs £7.95.
It covers the events of January 1607, including the flooding in Barnstaple, as well as a minor earthquke in May of the same year.
Parish Registers
The Barnstaple parish register mentions the deaths of James, Sabine and Catherine Frost when their house was destroyed.
|
Country Life in Devon
has the following quote from the register:
In the 20th day of Januarie there was such a mightie storm and tempeste from the river of Barnstaple with the comminge of the tyde that it cost much lost of goods and houses to the vallew of towe thousand pounds, besyde the death of one James Froste, a looker and towe of his children, the which his house fell downe upon them and killed them. This storme begane at 3 of clock in the morning and continue tyll 12 of clock of the same day. ........in Januarie the ryver of Barnstaple was so frozen that manye hundred people did walke over hande in hande from the bridge into Castell Rocke with staves in their hands as safe as they could goe on drye grounde being ye very same moneth the floude was. |
The parish register for Rockhampton, near Berkeley on Severn mentions the flooding:
1606.
Note. The twentieth day. . . . the sea did overflow the bankes and sea-walls, insomuch that very many people and cattle were drowned all along by Seaverne side from Bristowe to Gloucester.
The Arlingham parish registers include a paragraph on the flood:
There is a memorandum that on Tuesday in the forenoon, being the 20th of January, 1606-7,
"there was in Arlingham, and also .............. Severne, an exceeding great fludd, and the greater by reason of the south west winde, so hye that one might have morde a boate at Thomas Vinges gate; when many lost their sheepe and other cattle and their goods, Horsecroft and Newbridge being then sowde with wheat, and all overflowde; and had it not been for the C........... boate, which was commonly used upon 10th daye, and in the Tenure of Mr Robert Yate and Thomas ...... , manye, about the number of 20, had lost their lives, or, at the least, binne greatly endangered to be pined or starv'd to death. Mr Thomas Yate and his eldest son, Mr Richard Yate, were then hemm'd in upon the Glass Cliffe with the water. I say it is an admirable memorandum, because it exceeded the fludd that was about 46 years before, a foot and a half at the least higher than it was then. Cursed be the hand that raseth this memorable Recorde out of this Booke. Upon the same day Mrs Anne (who then was not churched), for feare of the waters, was, with Mr Childe, then vicar, and his familie, fain to be hurried over with the boate from the V icaridge. And this day was just 3 weekes after Elizabeth Childe was born. Per me, Hen: CHILDE, Vicarius [de] Arlingham."
"The somer following there was a most extreame hott somer, in so much that many died with heat; and in 1607 was a wonderful frost; after all which followed a dearth. Per me, Hen: Childe."
"A primary source for the Great Flood was written by John Paul, the Vicar of Almondsbury on 26th January 1606, which I will recount here in part (in its original language to avoid bias in interpretation):
But the yeere 1606, the fourth of K (King) James, the ryver of Severn rose upon a sodeyn Tuesday mornyng the 20 of January beyng the full pryme day and hyghest tyde after the change of the moone by reason of a myghty strong western wynd. So that from Mynhead to Slymbryge the lowe groundes alongst the ryver Severne were that tuornyng tyde overflowen, and in Saltmarsh many howses overthrowne, sundry Chrystyans drowned, hundreds of rudder cattell and horses peryshed, and thowsandes of sheep and lambs lost. Unspeakable was the spoyle and losse on both sydes the ryver.
[..snip..]
The salt water was in Rednyng in Sansoms new chamber to the upper stepp save twoo, and in Hobbes house syx foote hyghe. In Ellenhurst at Wades howse the sea rose neere 7 foote and in some howses there yt ran yn at one wyndow and out at an other.
[..snip..] Also in Brysto by credyble report that mornyng tyde was hygher than that Evenyng tyde by nyne foote of water. John Paul, Vicar of Almondsbury, 26th January 1606
Burton's Admirable Curiosities (find in a library) states
A mighty west wind continuing 16 hours brought the Sea into the Severn (after a great rain and a spring tide) with such violence that it began to overflow its banks from the Mount in Cornwall, along on both sides into Somerset and Gloucestershire. In some places the water rose 3 foot, in others 5 and 7, and in some towns and villages higher than the tops of the houses; so that 80 persons were drowned, much cattle, divers churches and parishes overwhelmed, with much harm in Wales, the damage being reckoned above 20,000 pounds.
Walter Yonge, of Colyton and Axminster writes in his Diary:
The 20th of Jan 1606-7, by reason of a great tempest, the sea brake in at divers places on the north side of this country, as at Barnstaple, where was much hurt done. At Bridgwater two villages near thereabouts and one market town overflown, and report of 500 persons drowned, besides many sheep, and other cattle. At Bristol it flowed so high that divers packs, which were brought thither against Paul's fair, standing together in a common hall of the city, for such purposes, stood three foot deep in water.*
* The Camden Society reprint of this diary (1848) has the following footnote:
Fuller in his "Mixt Contemplations on these Times" speaks of the sad overflowing of the Severn sea on both sides; of which John Stowe, the industrious chronicler, wrote an account from the communications of Dr. Still, Bishop of Bath and Wells, and three other gentlemen. Fuller moralises the mention of dogs, cats, foxes, hares, conies, moles, mice, and rats having saved themselves upon some eminences - an unhappy family, still peaceably disposed towards each other. At Barnstaple, the water rose five or six feet higher than was ever remembered. This was doubtless a terrific storm in the British channel. One hundred persons lost their lives. The damage was estimated at £1000.
Nature January 18th 1930 has a small feature in its regular "Historical Natural Events" column:
Jan.20, 1607. Severn Floods. - Stow records that "the waters rose above the tops of the houses", and the event is commemorated by a painted board in the church at Kingston Seymour. The flood came suddenly; many persons were drowned and much cattle and goods lost; the water in the church was five feet high and lay on the ground about ten days. The floods extended along the coast for about 20 miles and reached a depth of 12 feet in places. The East Anglian fens were widely flooded by the same storm, and in Romney Marsh the sea came in so "outrageously" that it did not seem as if the area could ever be reclaimed.* The last edition of John Stow's "Annales or a Generall Chronicle of England" (find in a library) finished on March 26, 1605, within ten days of his death. The references to Stow are presumably to later editions "amended" by Edmund Howes from 1615 and 1631.
* The reference to Romney Marsh seems to be taken from the "Somersetshire" pamphlet, in which case it is not the same flood, but an example of earlier flooding described to show that "our punishment (is) greater, because our treason against God is more horrible."
Camden in his work, Britannia, which was published shortly later in 1607, mentions the flood.
The Fenny tract, extended below this for some miles, is call'd the Moor; which at my present reviewing these notes has suffer'd a most lamentable devastation. For the Severn-Sea after a Spring-tide, being driven back by a Southwest-wind (which continued for 3 days without intermission) and then again repuls'd by a very forcible Sea-wind, it raged with such a tide, as to overflow all this lower tract, and also that of Somersetshire over against it; undermining several Houses, and overwhelming a considerable number of cattel and men.
John Stradling's Epigrams Some poems written at the time give another view of the event, with more evidence of what happened. These epigrams were written in Latin by John Stradling. The English translation is taken from John Stradling's Epigrams Book 4. In 1606 he wrote a poem about "the seawall at Aberthaw, constructed for the containment of the Severn, a herculean labour completed within five months".
In 1607 he wrote another about "the incredible flooding of the Severn, in which that seawall recently built at Aberthaw was overcome and wholly torn apart"