Storm Event
‘the Spring-Tide was higher than was ever known in the Memory of Man; the water flowed near two Foot in Westminster-Hall, where several Boats attended and carried a great Number of Persons from the Court of Common-Pleas’
Source
This event saw the highest tide for 50 years in the Thames Estuary (Brazel, 1968). The high tide combined with a brief northerly gale led to flooding in this event (Lamb, 1991).
Pathway
The sea wall near the marsh grounds Rochester ‘blew up’ allowing the sea to flood the grounds behind it. The banks between Spalding and Wisbech suffered 17 breaches, some of which were very large and several hundred acres of land were overflowed (PastPresented.info, n.d.).
Receptor and Consequence
This event was associated with flooding in Thames Estuary, Lincolnshire, and East Anglia (Hickey, 1997). In Westminster Hall, the water was two feet deep that the lawyers were brought out of the hall in boats (Marusek, 2011). Many houses in Rotherhith were flooded. In marsh grounds near Rochester, many sheeps were drowned, one person even lost 200 of the sheeps. In Kent, 500 sheeps were drowned. In Essex, the damage was estimated to be £100,000. Isles of Foulness and Canvey were under water that the inhabitants have to be rescued by boats (PastPresented.info, n.d.).
Summary Table
| Loss of life | 5 people were drowned |
| Residential property | Many houses in Rotherhith flooded. |
| Evacuation & Rescue | Isles of Foulness and Canvey were under water that the inhabitants have to be rescued by boats. |
| Cost | In Essex, damage was estimate to be £100,000. |
| Ports | * |
| Transport | * |
| Energy | * |
| Public services | Westminster Hall flooded 2 feet deep. |
| Water & wastewater | * |
| Livestock | Many sheeps drowned near Rochester (one person lost 200 sheeps). 500 sheeps drowned in Kent. |
| Agricultural land | * |
| Coastal erosion | * |
| Natural environment | Marsh grounds near Rochester flooded. |
| Cultural heritage | * |
| Coastal defences | The sea wall near the marsh grounds ‘blew up’. The banks between Spalding and Wisbech breached in 17 places. |
*No known sources of information available
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References
- Brazell, J. H. (1968). London weather. London: H. M. S. O
- Lamb, H. H. (1991). Historic Storms of the North Sea, British Isles and Northwest Europe. Cambridge University Press. Available at: http://assets.cambridge.org/97805216/19318/excerpt/9780521619318_excerpt.pdf(Accessed: 13 March 2015).
- PastPresented.info, (no date). ‘The North Sea Floods of February 1736’. [Online]. Available at: http://www.pastpresented.info/cour-flood1736.htm (Accessed: 11 July 2019).
- Hickey, K. R. (1997). Documentary records of coastal storms in Scotland, 1500-1991 A.D. Coventry University. Available at: https://curve.coventry.ac.uk/open/file/aa6dfd04-d53f-4741-1bb7-bdf99fb153be/1/hick1comb.pdf.
- Marusek, J. A. (2011). A Chronological Listing of Early Weather Events. SPPI Reprint Series. Available at: http://www.breadandbutterscience.com/Weather.pdf (Accessed: 6 August 2018).