Early Greenville Storms

Tornado skipping across the prairie. In 1870 the Galveston Daily News confused a hurricane with a tornado. A tornado struck Greenville, Texas, without warning. The town was damaged but unable to build a new courthouse, the citizens resorted to patching it for four more years.

Texas’ springs are notorious for wild weather and this year seems to be no exception. Frequently we get violent winds, hail, and maybe even tornados from the west.

Then we all hunker down in front of the television to watch the weatherman since all other programs are preempted. We know where the storm is, we see video of it, and we learn when it will hit the next town. But imagine facing a storm without television, social media, or radar screens flashing the latest movement of a storm.

Many of us have done so in our lifetimes. I am thoroughly convinced Texans of that time period were divided into three groups: those who went to the cellar, those who stayed out because they were afraid of snakes in the cellar, and those who loved to watch the clouds. My dad and I fell into the latter group.

Throughout my lifetime, there has always been some system to warn citizens of tornados and to a certain extent hail storms and potential flooding. Yet I found newspaper articles from throughout Texas reporting a “hurricane” that swept into Hunt County from Grayson County in June of 1870. A hurricane is defined as a huge storm up to 60 miles wide with winds between 75 and 200 miles per hour over the open ocean.

Open ocean covering Grayson and Hunt Counties in 1870; I think not. But there was no U. S. Weather Bureau in 1870 so the excited newspaper editor of the Galveston Daily News probably got a little carried away. Other reports continued to state that Greenville and the surrounding vicinity had a hailstorm and tornado. Crops, some ten to twelve buildings, especially a hotel, and the printing press at the Greenville Morning Herald were damaged or destroyed.

Evidently there were no deaths but probably injuries. The odd thing about the report is that it neglected to state the Hunt County Courthouse was severely damaged. However, there is a good reason for that. The same month lawyer T. D. Montrose arrived in Greenville. He wrote “the courthouse, a two-story brick structure, much shackled and dilapidated, the dimensions of which were about 40 feet by 40 feet, stood in the center of the square.”

It seems the county built its third courthouse in there in 1858-59 with donations from citizens and practicing attorneys. This was to be a permanent brick building but often described as “squatty.” Funds for maintenance were lacking during the Civil War and Reconstruction. Huge locust trees and a plank fence for hitching horses almost hid the structure from sight.

The storm supposedly happened during the day of June 18. The County Commissioners immediately went into session to authorize Edmond Joe Darden to purchase materials and make repairs. At the July session, the commissioners appointed five men to draw up a draft for a new courthouse. It wasn’t until four years later that those men presented their plans. It seems the citizens weren’t too concerned. After all, the building was still standing.