One hundred years ago
THE pretty little watering-place of Sandgate, near Folkestone, was visited on Saturday evening with a misfortune which, although unattended by loss of life, involved almost as much ruin as an earthquake could have caused. The rows of houses facing the sea, and chiefly let in lodgings, are built, it is said, above a stratum of greensand, which in flood-time is always more or less unsafe. The recent heavy rains caused masses of water to accumulate in the hills in the rear, and on Saturday the sand began to slip, and the houses to rock, bulge, and expand, some of the gaps presenting the strangest appear- ance. The alarmed people fled at once with most of their furniture, and were sheltered in the school-houses and other buildings. The pavements were thrown up, the pipes were broken so as to cut off gas and water, and, in fact, the brightest section of the town is com- pletely ruined. Three hundred families — fifteen hundred persons — are in the deepest distress, for most of them depended on their houses, which, though not levelled, cannot be safely inhabited, or, indeed, rebuilt upon so dangerous a site. Moreover, visitors will not go to a place so stricken. Many of the inhabitants believe that the disaster is due to the recent blowing-up of a wreck by Government order, on the shore; but their explanation seems unscientific, while the force of a burst- ing reservoir, which is what a bed of greensand is when saturated, will account for anything. The Lord Mayor has opened a subscription for the unhappy people, but, as we have observed elsewhere, there is more pity in England for the poor than for the ruined.
The Spectator 11 March 1893
Previous page
