Great Gale of 1848: "the most terrible gale ever known"
Impact on Florida
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Date of landfall: September 24,1848 |
Lives lost (FL): 0 |
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Category/wind speed: 4/101-135mph |
Cost of damages: $20,000 |
Canter Brown, writing for the Sunland Tribune, in Digital Commons at USF, describes Tampa prior to the gale. In 1848, Tampa was a small and slowly growing community. Until 1845 when Florida achieved statehood and Tampa was pinpointed as Hillsborough County’s seat, the military authorities at Fort Brooke had discouraged settlement in the area. When the hurricane of 1848 came in September of that year, 150-200 people lived in Tampa. Most civilians lived near Fort Brooke, while the homesteads of more affluent families scattered the area that makes up the heart of Tampa today (Brown, 1998).
Burgert Brothers, "Scene at Tampa Bay, Florida, 1846" (1846). Burgert Brothers Collection of Tampa Photographs. Image 640.
The Great Gale of 1848 was one of the strongest to impact the Tampa Bay area (1848 Tampa Bay Hurricane, 2022). It had winds estimated at 88-117 knots/101-135 mph, consistent with a category 4 hurricane, and surge heights at 15 feet above water level (National Centers for Environmental Information, n.d.).
Even though the locals were completely caught by surprise and many of them panicked there was no recorded loss of life during the Great Gale. First-hand accounts, captured in diaries and letters tell of houses being blown to pieces and waters from the bay rising up around buildings (Brown, 1998).
The most substantial impact of the storm, it seems, is how it changed the surrounding area. Ships were washed ashore inland and up river by the storm surge. The size and shape of many of the keys around Tampa bay were changed while some were washed away (Grismer, 1948). Navigational charts made before the storms were made useless by the amount of change to waterways, keys, and the coastal geography (1848 Tampa Bay Hurricane, 2022).
Tampa Bay history, captured by Hampton Dunn in the Phototouring Florida Collection, is littered with stories of things that were destroyed by the Great Gale of 1948. Dr. Odet Phillipi, the first white settler of Tampa Bay, who had cultivated a 100-acre orange grove saw it destroyed by the storm and surge (Dunn, 1960b). 1948 also saw the founding of the first church in Tampa, only to see it wash away in September (Dunn, 1960c). A lighthouse had also been built by the U.S. Federal government on Egmont Key in 1948 just before the storm came through. Marvel Edwards, the keeper of the light could tell the structure couldn’t take the gale. He took his family out in a small boat and tethered it to a palm tree in the middle of the key. They managed to ride out the hurricane unharmed. Edward’s had been right. The lighthouse was completely obliterated. Marvel Edwards never worked in lighthouses again (Dunn, 1960a).
The Story of St. Petersburg by Karl Grismer, in the City, County, and Regional Histories E-Book Collection also mentions the storm. Across the bay in Pinellas, two large fish ranches were destroyed by the storm, driving away the fisherman (Grismer, 1948).
 Head Quarters, Army of the South (1839) Map of the seat of war in Florida. Florida Maps Collection. |
 War Dept. (1856) Military map of the peninsula of Florida south of Tampa Bay. Florida Maps Collection. |