Children collecting wood from fallen trees
Wednesday
29th March 1916: News is coming in of the damage caused by
yesterday’s great storm. In the town centre of Bedford a gable end blew in over
Messrs Golding and Company’s shop in the High Street. The Bull clock and the
Town Clock were blocked up with snow and both stopped at quarter past three. At
the Modern School a flagstaff was blown over, smashing one of the battlements
of the turret, and in Midland Road a window, complete with its frame, was blown
out of the Co-operative Society’s Hall. Along with the gale came flooding as
Monday night’s snow melted; many houses were flooded out at Biddenham and at
Goldington the green was largely underwater and a number of cottages were
surrounded.
Soldiers billeted in the Bedford area have begun
clearing the many fallen trees from the roads and removing others which had
been uprooted and toppled into the river at Bedford. In Newnham Lane no less
than 39 large trees were blown down. The Town Council has permitted householders
to fill their wood sheds by taking branches of no more than six inches diameter
from the fallen trees, a task likely to take several days. In Kempston the
famous walnut orchard of Mr. Walter
Harter, J.P. has been wrecked by the great gale. Three hundred and sixty five
trees had been planted in 1815 to commemorate the Battle of Waterloo. These had
since been thinned, leaving about half the original number, and others have
occasionally blown down; of the 160 remaining trees, only 40 survived yesterday’s
storm.
At Luton the roof blew off a stand at the football
ground, with part being flung onto the Great Northern railway line behind where
it hit a standing railway carriage. The Club secretary estimates that the
damage will cost £150. Some of the huts at Biscot Camp suffered badly and the
men were housed for the night at the Corn Exchange, St. Mary’s Hall and the Fire
Station. Many trees were blown down in Wardown Park and elsewhere, and a number
of motor cars had to be abandoned by their drivers. An employee at the Vauxhall
Motors works in Kimpton Road was badly injured by a falling bough on Tuesday
evening as she was entering the mess-room.
During the initial snow fall on Monday
evening a motor car collided with a footstone of the Market Cross at Leighton
Buzzard due to snow obscuring the windscreen and covering the headlamps. On
Tuesday afternoon farmer had great difficulty getting home from Leighton
market, and a number of tradesmen were stranded during their delivery rounds. The
Postmaster at Leighton reports that he has never seen or heard of such a “hopeless
tangle of wires”, with all telegraphic communication interrupted and almost all
telephone wires broken. Soulbury Road in Linslade was almost blocked by snow drifts
three to four feet deep. At Husborne Crawley a large chimney stack was blown on
to the roof of a public house where it crashed through the roof and through the
bedroom floor into the room below; fortunately nobody was nearby and there were
no injuries. Motor cars sent to meet the Duke of Bedford at Bletchley Station
were unable to get there, and the Duke was forced to sleep on a couch at the
Station Hotel, which was already full of stranded passengers. The next day he
set out for Woburn in the hotel motor car but was stopped by fallen trees
across the road; he then decided to walk to Woburn, leaving his valet and
luggage to return to the station.
Sources:
Luton News 30th March 1916; Leighton Buzzard Observer 4th April 1916;
Bedfordshire Times 31st March & 7th April 1916; Bedfordshire Standard 7th April 1916
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