Jasper County Democrat, Volume 1, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 March 1899 — WINDSTORM DEALS DEATH. [ARTICLE]

WINDSTORM DEALS DEATH.

Tornado Sweeps Across Alabama, Mississippi and Arkansas. Eleven (>ersons were killed and fifteen injured in Saturday night’s cyclone near Edwardsville, Cleburne, Ala. The cyclone began six miles west of Edwardsville, near Iron City, and swept the country for twelve miles. Its path was from 100 to 200 yards wide. The greater part of the country it moved over was wooded land and hundreds of trees were uprooted or twisted off at the ground. At intervals the storm would rise above the ground and skip along from fifty to 100 feet above the earth. Then it would descend again and lift houses bodily from the ground and dash them to pieces. Immense timbers were carried high into the air, and some were driven through trees. The residence of Lewis Coffee, tax assessor of Cleburne County, was a large double log house on a little hill. Coffee, his wife and nine children were at home. The house was crushed like an eggshell and its timbers blown 200 yards away. Ten of the eleven occupants were instantly killed. Their bodies looked as if they had been lifted high into the air and dashed repeatedly to the earth. The body of one of the children was found wrapped about a stump like a string. All were stripped of their clothing and all had their brains dashed out.