Georgia major hurricane #1: The Dredful Hurry-Cane of 1804

Henry Laurens, South Carolina plantation owner to his new overseer, John Loveday, June 21, 1777: Around the middle of August begin got be much upon your Guard about tempestuous Weather. I caution you because you have never seen a Hurricane, you shd have Bars of strong Wood ready to fasten in all your Windows, keep every Article liable to Damage six inches off your Floors, and nothing so low as the common Surface of the Earth in the Cellars, these you must expect to be brim full, your House and Outhouses overflowed, your fences blown down...prepare against the worst while The Weather is fair. Save all those Cypress Boards near the Counting House and in the Yard for repairing Fences and in case of Disaster send for [the slaves] Burnet and Sam.
The great storm was first felt at Antigua, St. Kitts and St. Bartholomew on the morning of September 3, 1804. At St. Kitts, every ship in the harbor (about 100) was "entirely lost". Rain swept houses into the sea. 56 our of 58 vessels were sunk in the harbor of St. Bartholomew, 58 more vessels at Antigua out of an unknown number, and 26 out of 28 at Dominica. The wreckage littered the beaches of the Leeward Islands. The hurricane then crossed Puerto Rico and the Turks Islands, sinking numerous vessels there on September 4-5.
On September 7, rising winds at St. Augustine sank 10 out of 11 ships there. The Georgia and South Carolina Almanac predicted "fresh northerly winds" for September 7 bringing a break to summer heat, but but afternoon planters on the Georgia coast were becoming increasingly concerned as winds increased and the tide rose high. Major Pierce Butler on St. Simons Island had as his guest at his plantation, Hampton, the Vice President of the United States, Aaron Burr, who was a fugitive. 2 months earlier the Vice President had murdered Alexander Hamilton, the first Treasury Secretary of the United States, in a duel, and warrants were out for his arrest. That morning, two slaves had rowed Vice President Burr across Jones Creek to John Couper's plantation for lunch, but as the weather deteriorated that afternoon the slaves were too frightened to row Aaron Burr back. So he stayed at Couper's plantation, while the weather worsened through the night. Wind shook the house and tore away the piazza towards dawn.
By then, the horses had started to scream in terror--a sound Vice President Burr said he never forgot.
The winds continued to strengthen through the morning, but a stroke of good fortune saved everyone. The eye crossed at around 1:30 that afternoon at dead low water, during a spring tide. A spring tide brings higher high tides, but lower low tides, and the range during spring tides is 10 feet, so that made a big difference. The tide level was "7 feet above the normal high tide" according to Aaron Burr's account. The normal tide range is ~8 feet, with spring low tides about a foot lower than normal, and spring high tides a foot higher. So the low tide that day was 9 feet below a normal high tide. Equaling a storm surge of 16 feet. Burr prevailed on the slaves assigned to attend to him to row back to Major Butler's plantation during the eye. They barely made it as the back eyewall of the hurricane struck just as they were landing and they rushed in to the plantation house. They were safe.
But many others were not. Broughton Island was a rice plantation on a low marshy island in the mouth of the Altamaha River just north of St. Simons. It had been bought in 1802 from the aforementioned Henry Laurens by William Brailsford. He had given specific instructions for the slaves, numbering about 100, to be removed to safety to the high bluffs of Darien if a hurricane approached, but for some reason the overseer hesitated. Despite the low astronomical tide, the sea swept over the island, and more than 70 slaves were swept away. Their bodies were never recovered.
The hurricane swept to the north apparently just to the east of I-95, spreading destruction in its wake. The plantations at Sunbury, Midway, Darien all had slaves drown, although not as many as in Broughton Island. 2 dead here, 5 dead there, more dead at the next plantation, it was adding up.
By the evening of September 8, 1804 the hurricane was over Savannah, with the east eyewall lashing Tybee island, with the high tide. A few people made it to the lightkeeper's house on the highest part of the island--all the rest of Tybee was submerged. On Cockspur Island fronting Savannah was Fort Greene, a two story timber and tabby structure. Lieutenant Piatt ordered all the soldiers and their families into the fort at 10:00 a.m., but the fort was no match for the storm surge on the low marshy island, and the hurricane methodically took apart the fort, slinging soldiers, their wives and children into the raging water as night fell. Only 7 soldiers survived. All the wives and children drowned.
Hutchinson Island is a low lying island across from Savannah on the river. It was subdivided into numerous rice holdings and none of the families there were prepared to save their slaves--they did not organize to take their slaves to safety--the slaves were all panic stricken in a mob and no one was willing to take another owner's slave. The white owners got on boats and crossed the river to Savannah and the slaves were left to fend for themselves. They didn't. Over 100 drowned. The hurricane continued its deadly sweep into South Carolina the night of Sept 8-9. Beaufort's storm tide reached 9 feet higher than ever recorded there before. At Charleston, the tide reached 3 feet higher than in the great hurricane of 1752, a Hugo-type storm that passed just to the east of the city--as the eye went by the winds shifted to the north and northwest and limited the surge, which had reached near 20 feet in Bulls Bay in the 1752 hurricane. The 1804 hurricane sent waters surging through the streets of Charleston where they had never been before. Waves tore down houses on East Bay street. Numerous people were killed by falling chimneys. Water surged 2 feet deep in Meeting Street, which had never been flooded before. The hurricane then swept through Georgetown, with the surge sweeping through every street. The list of households in Beaufort, Charleston, and Georgetown suffering fatalities is too numerous to list here.
At least 500, (and this is a minimum figure) died on land drowning from the surge in Georgia and South Carolina during the hurricane of 1804. About 90% of these deaths were slaves. This does not include more than 30 people who died in Savannah and Charleston from flying debris and falling chimneys, and it does not include at least 200 deaths in ships offshore in the Charleston and Savannah shipping lanes. So the death toll in GA/SC was ~800 people. I do not have the figures for how many died in the Leeward Islands and Puerto Rico. Numerous ships east of the Bahamas disappeared as well. Timeline
Sept 3: Antigua, St. Kitts, St. Bartholomew
Night/early morning Sept 3/4: Puerto Rico
Sept 5: Turks Islands
Sept 7, evening: Ships of St. Augustine wrecked
Sept 8, 1:30 p.m. Eye at St. Simons Island
7:00 p.m. Eye between Savannah and Tybee Island
Sept 9 midnight Charleston
morning Georgetown (storm motion slowed greatly)
The size of this hurricane's windfield was larger than average---large areas in GA/SC experienced hurricane force winds simultaneously. The eye seems to have been fairly small, and stayed small, ~15 miles in diameter.
The center of the eye seems to have gone NNW over the east side of St. Simons Island, before heading to the north, east of I-95, between Savannah and Tybee Island, just inland of Charleston, and then slowing and out to sea just above Georgetown.
Judging by the tides, the hurricane seems to have maintained Cat 3 strength at Charleston despite having been inland (if only a short distance from the sea) for more than 150 miles. The 16 foot surge on St. Simons, on the left side of the eye, and the 18-20 foot surges along the north Georgia coast indicate the hurricane was a solid Cat 4.
The hurricane caused damage in Cape Cod and Nantucket/ Martha's Vinyard on September 12. It does not seem to have had great strength--and was moving slowly enough to weaken considerably over cooler water before reaching there. It may have been a tropical storm by that point.
Coming up--the major hurricane of 1813!