Towanda, Kansas Tornado
April 1892
Towanda, Kas., Has But One Building Left -
Five Killed Outright.
Wichita, Kans., April 2. -- A tornado,
attended by the greatest number of fatalities
ever
credited to as single storm in the west swept
over southwestern Kansas Thursday night, leaving
in its wake death and destruction. It
almost annihilated the villages of Augusta and
Towanda, leaving so little standing in the
latter that it is a marvel how as soul escaped.
But one building was left intact in Towanda, a
place of 300 souls. Five people were
killed outright, namely:
Dr. J. D.
Godfrey, H. Cupp, J. B. Bailey, John Blake,
George Blake. Ten others are fatally
injured and a half hundred more or less
seriously maimed.
Davenport Daily Leader, Davenport, IA 3
Apr 1892
At Towanda, the baby of
James Blake was one
of the victims. It met death in a terrible
manner. Its body was not found until
Friday noon and the searchers were horrified to
see that it was without a head. It had
been decapitated . . . In the temporary morgue
the head and body were laid together and a
narrow ribbon tied about the baby's throat would
have concealed the wound. The parents of
the infant were both among the very seriously
wounded.
Aspen Weekly Times, Aspen CO, 9 Apr
1892
C. L. Hertcole, who was injured by the storm
which devastated Towanda on Thursday night ....
[has] been added to the list of those killed.
Aspen Weekly Times, Aspen CO, 9 Apr
1892
Charles Anderson, living near Towanda, heard
a roaring and went to the door to see what it
was. As he opened the door the storm
struck the house and carried it away, leaving
him standing in his night clothes just where the
house had been. It took the house from
under his feet, and he says he never felt a
breath of wind until after the tornado had
passed and the force of the gale was felt again.
A threshing machine was standing by the side
of the barn and the wind tore it to pieces.
The boiler of the steam engine was taken clear
over the barn and dropped on the roof of the
house of Jim Donahue, crushing it in and killing
a child aged six and breaking Mrs. Donahue's
arm. The barn was untouched.
The people of Towanda had little time to note
the various awful things which were happening,
but one incident will be remembered as long as
they live. The family of
James Gibson were
standing in their door watching the storm when
they saw something come rolling down the street
toward them. It looked like a log, but
bent and twisted in such as to excite their
curiosity, and as it was stopped in a gutter
near their house they went out to make an
investigation after the storm had passed. It was
the body of a young woman who had been stripped
of every stitch of clothing except one stocking,
and it was only by this stocking that they were
enabled to identify her. It was that of
Miss Belle Merritt, who was considered the most
beautiful young lady in this part of the
country. She was so disfigured that no
semblance of her former self remained. She
was alive when found but died within a few hours
without recovering consciousness.
The family of George Jackson sought shelter
in a cyclone cellar when the storm came up, but
a big tree was thrown on the cellar and crushed
through, breaking the arm of Mrs. Jackson.
The stripping of chickens of their feathers
is reported from several localities, and similar
stories are told of the marvelous action of the
tornado.
The Atlanta Constitution, Atlanta, GA 1
May 1892
Towanda Tornado. On the night of
March 31, 1892, a tornado touched Towanda and
nineteen of the places in Kansas with a fury
that suggested a cyclone, and at each place left
behind dead or wounded.
When the tragic news was received in El
Dorado, on April 1, many believed the report to
be an April Fool's joke. The Wichita
Eagle said: "The greatest calamity
reported is from Towanda, eighteen miles east of
Wichita, on the St. Louis and San Francisco
railroad. Towanda's population yesterday
numbered 300 souls. The village is in
ruins. Only one house is undamaged.
The dead are Dr. John
D. Godfrey, physician;
Herschel Cupp,
21-year-oldson of
Daniel Cupp, one of the earliest
settlers of Kansas;
John Bailey, 21; six-year-old child
of John Blake,
merchant. Those fatally hurt --
Miss Annie Robbins
35, postmistress; Mrs.
John Kerr; Earl Kerr, 11; Fern
Maxwell, 8;
C. L. Wescate, 80. The
seriously hurt are:
Willie Maxwell, Miss Lucy Poorbaugh,
hip broken; Effie Kerr,
Elmore Hall, Mrs. Cory, Mrs. Walter Mooney,
William Mitchell, Mrs. George Cornelius, Mrs.
William Mitchell, M. H. Hibbs, Walter Mooney and
Myrtle Mooney.
Butler County's Eighty Years 1855-1935,
pages 106-107
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