A Night of Terror in Dixie
A sudden cloudburst near Walla Walla sweeps away a family's home, leaving two children dead in the debris.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
A severe thunderstorm struck the valley between Upper Dry Creek and the Coronet ridge. The storm was accompanied by hail, which fell to a depth of several inches. Near the head of one of the gulches, about 13 miles northeast of Walla Walla, the residents were awakened by a great roaring sound. A body of water, estimated at forty feet wide and ten or more feet deep, rushed down the valley. The home of William Brunton, where his family and a hired girl named Delia Sargent were staying, was struck. The kitchen floor gave way, and Charles Brunton, nine years and five months of age, disappeared into the torrent. The others were swept from their feet into a large pear tree, to which they clung for what seemed like hours. The bodies of the missing boy and the hired girl were later found a few yards apart, about two miles below the residence, buried in debris. This was the first flood of any importance since the valley was peopled by the whites, causing several thousand dollars in property damage.
“The torrent carried away the bridge over Dry creek at Dixie, and tore great holes in the road near Mr. Pitcher's.”
This 1883 tragedy reflects the brutal unpredictability of the region's geography, where rapid development in flood-prone zones often outpaced knowledge of local weather patterns. Today, while we have better mapping, the tension between land settlement and environmental hazards remains a central challenge for Washington's expanding communities.
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