Thursday 16 December 1858, The Maitland Mercury & Hunter River General Advertiser
NEW ENGLAND.
(From the Armidale Express, Dec. 11.)
WOLLOMOMBI.
A violent hailstorm fell over this place on Saturday last, such as has not occurred in the memory of any of its oldest inhabitants, and several persons on the station at the time – some who had been for many years in the colony, and some natives – never recollect having seen anything of the kind. Even the blacks had never seen the like before. It lasted half an hour, and though the hailstones were not of any extraordinary size, yet, from their violence they cut up every thing within their influence. The creek rose to a height not exceeded in the great rains of 1857, and such a body of hailstones had collected that they came down the creek in a mass and it was strange to see the water flowing under the hail when it was collected by the turns and narrowings of the creek. The garden, which was in a very flourishing condition, is now a complete wreck, the soil in many parts being washed away to the clay bottom ; and on the banks of the creek a solid mass of hailstones upwards of 4 feet deep lay deposited and what renders it curious, notwithstanding the season of the year, it has not disappeared up to the present time, and is, in places out of the influence of the sun, lying to a depth of nearly three feet ! Strange to say, the hail and indeed the rain, seem to have been confined to the one spot for nothing of the kind was experienced half a mile from it.
You may rely on the truth of this statement.
Halls Cattle Station, Wollomombi, Nov. 22nd., 1858
Tagged: wollomombi
