19th Century
1802 LOCK TAY, Stone (doubtful)
1803 EAST NORTON, Leicestershire, Stone (doubtful)
1804 HIGH POSSIL, Strathclyde, Stone (L6)
1806 GLASTONBURY, Somerset, Stone (doubtful)
1806 BASINGSTOKE, Hampshire, Stone (doubtful)
1810 MOORESFOOT, County Tipperary, Stone(H5)
1813 LIMERICK, County Limerick, Stones(H5)
1813 MALPAS, Cheshire, (doubtful)
1813 PULROSE Isle of Man, Stones (doubtful)
1830 LAUNTON, Oxfordshire, Stone (L6)
1830 PERTH, Perthshire, Stone (LL5)
1835 ALDSWORTH, Gloucestershire, Stone(LL5)
1842 HARROGATE, Yorkshire, Stone (doubtful)
1842 CARDIFF Glamorgan, Stone (doubtful)
1844 KILLETER, County Tyrone, Stones(H6)
1865 DUNDRUM, County Tipperary, Stone(H5)
1876 ROWTON, Shropshire, Iron(IIIA)
1881 MIDDLESBROUGH Yorkshire, Stone (L6)
Extract, (no author) from Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, 1803, page 191.
Extract, from R.P. Greg's catalogue (1860)
FIRE-BALL.
On the 4th instant (July) a ball of fire struck the White
Bull, public-house, kept by John Hubbard at East Norton.
The chimney was thrown down by it, the roof in part torn
off, the windows shattered to atoms, and the dairy, pantry,
etc converted into a heap of rubbish. It appeared like a
luminous ball of considerable magnitude; and, on coming
in contact with the house, exploded with a great noise and
a very oppresive sulphurous smell. Some fragments of
this ball were found near the spot, and subjected to
chemical analysis by a gentleman in the neighbourhood, who
found them to consist of the same ingredients as those stones
of similar origin analysed by Mr. Howard and other
chemists, and nearly in the same proportions. The surface of
these stones is of a dark colour, and varnished as if by
fusion. From some indentures on the surface it appears
probable that the ball was soft when it descended; and it was
obviously in a state of ignition, as the grass, etc is burnt
up where the fragments fell. Its motion while in the air
was very rapid, and apparently parallel to the horizon.
meteor and detonation; struck a building; electricial?. Rather a curious account in Encyclopaedia Britannica. More like an electric ball, and yet a vitrified stone found containing nickeliferous iron. A little doubtful perhaps if meteoric.
A hard body, supposed to be of the nature of a meteoric stone, fell, during a hard thunder-storm, into a window at Glastonbury about a month ago.
Article by William Higgins in The Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, 1811, page 262.
XLVIII. Description and Analysis of a Meteoric Stone which fell in the County of Tipperary, in Ireland, in the Month of August 1810. By William Higgins, Esq.
To Mr. Tilloch.
Dear Sir, As meteoric stones have lately engaged the attention of the philosophical world, perhaps the following description and analysis of a stone that had fallen last August, during a thunder-storm, in the county of Tipperary, in Ireland, very near the house of Maurice Crosbie Moore, esq. will be acceptable to many of the numerous readers of your very useful Journal. It will at least add to the authenticity of those strange and unaccountable visitors, and tend to prove the resemblance to each other of the stones that have fallen in different parts of the world.
This stone was sent last spring to the Dublin Society, with an account of the circumstances attending its fall, in a letter from Mr. Moore, a printed copy of which I enclose. It was not injured by the fall, and was somewhat of a cubical shape, with the angles and edges of two sides rounded; the other two opposite sides exhibited a very uneven surface, occasioned by depressions and prominences, as if a part had been broken previous to the heat to which it must have been exposed before its fall.
It weighed seven pounds and three quarters, and the entire surface was covered over with a brownish black thin crust, evidently the effects of fusion by an intense and rapid heat. When broken, its internall appearance is of an ash-gray colour, and of a gritty coarse fracture in some degree resembling sand-stone, except some particular parts where a specular appearance occurs somewhat like a blackish-gray gneiss: in this case the smooth surfaces do not adhere so firmly as the other parts; the dark colour proceeds from mallable iron, which forms here and there a very thin coating.
followed by 4 pages of analysis, which I have omitted
Letter from Mr. Moore to Mr Higgins.
"Sir,--I had the honour of receiving a letter, requesting from me the particulars respecting a meteoric stone that fell near my house in the county of Tipperary, and which a short time ago I did myself the pleasure of presenting to the Dublin Society. The particulars are as follow:- Early last August, between eleven and twelve o'clock in the morning, I went from Mooresfort to Limerick; the day was dark and sultry. I returned in a few days, and was immediately informed by my steward and butler that a most wonderful phænomenon had occured very soon after my departure; they produced the stone, and gave the following account of the occurance there had been thunder; some workmen who were laying lead along the gutters of my house were suddenly astonished at hearing a whistling noise in the air; one said, The chimney is on fire; another said, It proceeds from a swarm of bees in the air. On looking up, they observed a small black cloud very low, carried by a different current of air from the mass of clouds, from whence thay imagined this stone to have proceeded: it flew with the greatest velocity over their heads, and fell in a field about three hundred yards from the houses they saw it fall. It was immediately dug up, and taken into the steward's office, where it remained two hours cooling before it could be handled. This account I have had from many who were present, and agree in the one story. I saw myself the hole the stone made in the ground; it was not more than a foot in depth. Should any thing further be wished for from me, I shall feel myself very happy in procuring fromm the men themselves their own account, and transmitting their own exact words and description to the Society.
I am sir,
your very humble servant.
Maurice Crosbie Moore
13 Lower Mount-street
May 22, 1811.
Friday morning, the 10th of September 1813, being very calm and serene, and the sky clear, about nine o'clock, a cloud appeared in the east, and very soon after I heard eleven distinct reports appearing to proceed thence, somewhat resembling the discharge of heavy artillery. Immediately after this followed a considerable noise not unlike the beating of a large drum, which was succeeded by an uproar resembling the continued discharge of musketry in line. The sky above the place whence this noise appeared to issue became darkened and very much disturbed, making a hissing noise, and from thence appeared to issue with great violence different masses of matter, which directed their course with great velocity in a horizontal direction towards the west. One of these was observed to descend; it fell to the earth, and sank into it more than a foot and a half, on the lands of Scagh, in the neighbourhood of Patrick's Well, in the county of Limerick.
It was immediately dug up, and I have been informed by those that were present, and on whom I could rely, that it was then warm and had a sulphurous smell. It weighed about 17 lb., and had no appearance of having been fractured in any part, for the whole of its surface was uniformly smooth and black, as if affected by sulphur or gunpowder.
Six or seven more of the same kind of masses, but smaller, and fractured, as if shattered from each other or from larger ones, descended at the same time with great velocity in different places between the lands of Scagh and the village of Adare.
One more very large mass passed with great rapidity and considerable noise at a small distance from me; it came to the ground on the lands of Brasky, and penetrated a very hard and dry earth about 2 feet. This was not taken up for two days; it appeared to be fractured in many places, add weighed about 65 lb.! Its shape was rather round, but irregular.
It cannot be ascertained whether the small fragments which came down at the same time corresponded with the fractures of this large stone in shape or number, but the unfractured part of the surface has the same appearance as the one first mentioned. There fell also at the same time, on the lands of Faha, another stone, which does not appear to have been part of or separated from any other mass; its skin is smooth and blackish, of the same appearance with the first mentioned; it weighed about 74 lb.; its shape was very irregular, for its volume was very heavy. . . . It was about 3 miles in a direct line from the lands of Brasky, where the very large stone descended, to the place where the small ones fell in Adare, and all the others fell intermediately; but they appeared to descend horizontally, and as if discharged from a bomb and scattered in the air.
The reference quoted for this in the BMNH catalogue is a letter by J. Murray in The Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, volume 54, page 39. but this only mentions an earlier article, and quotes details of a reported fall of similar material (Roa, Spain, 1438), to which Murray states "The analogy is very striking".
"You may remember that in one of my former papers I adverted to a meteoric stone which fell at Pulrose in the Isle of Man. The evidence which I collected seemed to attest the fact, and place it beyond a doubt; and yet its physical characters of extreme levity and scoriaceous texture, seemed to impose a doubt upon its identity..."
Notices of Aerolites. By Nevil Story Maskelyne.
10. Perth.
A small stone fell on the field known as the North Inch at Perth on May 17, 1830. The only record of its fall that I have as yet been able to trace is that which accompanied two small specimens of the aerolite, and is in the handwriting of the late Dr. Thomson of Glasgow, in whose collection it was preserved. Mr. Nevill became the owner of the specimens, and presented one of them to the Museum. He very liberally also let me have a microscopic section cut from his own specimen.
The note in Dr. Thomson's writing is as follows:˜-"Part of a meteorolite that fell on the North Inch of Perth during a thunderstorm on the 17th of May, 1830, at half-past 12 o'clock noon. The mass of which this is a portion was about 7 inches in diameter."
The section of this little stone exhibits a beautiful structure, placing it high in the series of chondritic aerolites. The spherules in it are rather numerous and pretty distinct, and exhibit great variety. The fanned kind of spherule, and some very sharp crystals of a mineral with a diagonal cleavage, are set in a small amount of a granular ground-mass. The general aspect of the stone presents a bluish-grey hue.
The iron in it is present in small particles very sparingly scattered, and also in some amount as fine microscopic (introcrystalline) dust. The particles of meteoric pyrites are in considerable excess over the iron particles, and there are seen here and there on a section small isolated spots of rust. Its specific gravity is = 3.494.
"Copy of a notice of the Meteorite entered in the Book of Donations of the Permanemt Library, Cirencester, by the late Mr. Arnold Merrick, Curator to the Museum.--'A specimen of a meteorite which fell about half a mile from Aldsworth in a field occupied by Mr. Waine, within twenty yards of his workmen, who were sitting against a wall at the time, on the 4th of August 1835, a sunny afternoon without a cloud. A meteor was seen at Cirencester proceeding eastward, and a remarkable noise was heard at half-past 4 in the afternoon. The noise was heard in most parts adjacent.
"'The workman saw no unusual light, but heard the aerolite rush through the air, and felt it shake the ground by striking it with great violence. It fell on a swarth of oats, and drove the straw before it down into the earth for six inches, till opposed by rock. When the men got it up, it was not hot, but the part of the surface which appeared not to have been broken was quite black and soiled the fingers. It weighs about 9270 grains. It contains a great deal of iron, but is not magnetic. Its specific gravity is 3.4.
"'Mr. Waine states that a shower of small pieces fell about half a mile south of the spot where this fell. Children thought it was a shower of black beetles, and held out their hands to catch them as they fell.'
My niece, Miss Anna Sophia Brown, now Mrs Pooley, about 4 p.m. on the same day, being in her father's garden at Cirencester, perceived a meteor passing from W. to E., apparently about twice the height of Cirencester tower, which is upwards of 100 feet high, looking like a copper ball larger than an orange [?], and having a tail or stream of light behind it. In its passage it made a rumbling noise heard by many persons, reminding her of thunder, and the people of the town marvelled that it should thunder in a serene day with a cloudless sky. On the same day at Aldsworth, 13 miles E. of Cirencester, the meteoric stone fell, the particulars of which are before given.
"Thos. C. Brown."
[ Note: a another version of this text appears in Volume 9, 1865, pages 341 to 343, the wording and puncation used differs slightly, and contains additional information quoted on other earlier falls in Ireland. No author is given. ]
The Rev. Samuel Haughton, F. R. S. Fellow of trinity College, Dublin, read a paper--
On the shower of aerolithes that fell at Killeter, county of Tyrone, on the 29th of April, 1844.
On the 29th of April, 1844, a shower of Meteoric Stones fell, in the sight of several people, at Killeter, near Castlederg, Co. Tyrone; they broke into small fragments by the fall, one piece only being found entire. It was (according to the testimony of a resident) "about as long as a joint of a little finger." The account given by three gentlemen, who, however, did not actually see the shower fall, was that they were at a distance of three or four miles, up the hills in the neighbourhood; it was a fine sunny evening, three or four o'clock. They heard "music" towards Killeter, which they supposed to proceed from a strolling German band, which they knew to be in the neighbourhood; they are under the impression that they heard the music several times in the course of the evening; they remember also to have noticed clouds in the direction of Killeter. On reaching Killeter the same evening, they were told of the wonderful shower of stones which had spread over several fields. I received the fragments of these stones from the Rev. Dr. M'Ivor, ex-Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, and rector of Ardstraw; he writes to me that "it is now very difficult to get either a specimen of a stone or any very distinct intelligence of them: even the very rumour of them has nearly died out, and you might ask intelligent middle-aged men about the neighbourhood who had never heard them mentioned." He adds that the people of that locality are very "uncurious," and that if these were a veritable burning bush thereabouts, few would "turn aside to see."
The largest specimen given to me by Dr. M'Ivor weighed 22.23 grs. in air, and 16.32 grs. in water, showing that its specific gravity is 3.761. Both it and the smaller fragments presented the usual black crust and internal greyish-white crystalline structure and appearance, with specks of metallic lustre, occasioned by the iron and nickel alloy that was present. I analyzed it in the usual manner; but, owing to an accident, I was unable to determine the composition of the earthly portion soluble in muriatic acid.
The following is the mineralogical composition of these Aerolithes:--
[ omitted analysis ]
On the Meteoric Stone that fell at Dundrum, County of Tipperary, on the 12th August, 1865.
The Meteoric Stone, that forms the subject of the present Paper,
fell near Dundrum, county of Tipperary, under circumstances that
were described to me as follows, by the man in whose garden it fell:--
"John Johnson."
It was afterwards presented by Lord Hawarden to the Geological Museum of Trinity College, where it is publicly exhibited.
The stone weighed 4lbs. 14½ oz. It is rudely pyramidal in form; the triangular base being a freshly broken surface, and the faces of the pyramid being covered by the usual black vitrified glaze. It is evidently a portion of a much larger stone; and as it appears from the foregoing statement that its vertical velocity was not great, it is probable that other pieces of the larger mass may yet be found in the neighbourhood of Dundrum.
A singular feature is observable in this stone that I have never yet seen in any other:--the rounded edges of the pyramid are sharply marked by lines on the black crust, as perfect as if made by a ruler. This appearance is strictly confined to the surface, and seems to be a result of some peculiar tension of the fused crust in cooling; for no trace of any continuation of the lines can be found in the interior of the stone.
On examination with the lens, specks of metallic iron and of magnetic pyrites are visible, and also a few minute grains of chrysolith; no other minerals can be detedted in the paste, which is of a dull grey, and of loose texture, almost like a porous sandstone; and the whole stone would attract little notice, were it not for its specific gravity, and the metallic particles visible in it.
[ then followed by three and a half pages of chemical analysis ]
X. THE ROWTON SIDERITE.
The metallic mass which I shall next proceed to describe is one of unusual interest
in more than one respect: in the first place, before it fell only one iron meteorite was
known to have fallen in Great Britain, while eight stony meteorites that have fallen
in the British islands are in the national collection; and, secondly, of the more than
300 meteorites which are contained in the collection in the Natural History Museum,
more than 100 are unquestionably iron meteorites, and of these the fall of seven only
has been witnessed.
The circumstances attending the fall of the Rowton iron are as follows. At about 20 minutes to 4 o'clock on the afternoon of the 20th of April, 1876, a strange rumbling noise was heard in the atmosphere, followed almost instantaneously by a startling explosion resembling a discharge of heavy artillery. There was neither lightning nor thunder, but rain was falling heavily, the sky being obscured with dark clouds for some time both before and after the incident related. About an hour after the explosion Mr. George Brooks had occasion to go to a turf field in his occupation adjoining the Wellington and Market Drayton Railway, about a mile north of the Wrekin, when his attention was attracted to a hole cut in the ground. The land where it fell, it should be stated, is part of the property of the Duke of Cleveland, at Rowton, near Wellington, in Shropshire; and Mr. Ashdown, the agent of the Duke, exerted himself in the matter, and obtained his Grace's assent to the meteorite being presented to the trustees of the British Museum.
As regards the hole which was found in the field, Mr. Brooks probed the opening with a stick and discovered a lump of metal of irregular shape, which proved to be a meteorite, weighing 7 ¾ lbs. It had penetrated to a depth of 18 inches, passing through 4 inches of soil and 14 inches of solid clay down to the gravel. The hole is nearly perpendicular, but the stone appears to have fallen in a south-easterly direction. Some men were at work at the time within a short distance, and they, together with many other people in the neighbourhood, heard the noise of explosion. According to other observers, the sound was heard as of something falling during a heavy shower of rain, accompanied by a hissing and then a rumbling noise. It is, moreover, stated that when Mr. Brooks found the mass "it was quite warm." Mr. Wills described it as being black on the surface and apparently covered with a scale of metallic oxides; but at the point where it impinged on the earth the oxides had been removed, and the metallic character of the mass had been revealed.
When the meteorite reached the British Museum it was at once seen that it was wholly metallic in structure and was covered with a very thin pellicle of the jet-black magnetic oxide of iron, and only where this had been removed by abrasion with the soil is the bright metallic surface of the nickel-iron revealed. The depth to which the meteorite penetrated the soil is proof of how much momentum still remained to it, partly due, no doubt, to the approximately vertical direction with which it entered the atmosphere, and in some degree to the higher density of an iron mass as compared with one of stone, the rocky meteorites rarely penetrating to so considerable a depth. The meteorite closely resembles the siderite of Nedagolla, in India, as Professor Story-Maskelyne, M.P., F.R.S., has pointed out.
The chemical analysis that followed has been omitted, and I don't yet have a copy of the drawing that was reproduced in the report
Rowton Iron meteorite(modern 1997 photograph), one face has been cut and etched
During the past year a very beautiful specimem of a meteorite fell near Middlesborough, at a spot called Pennyman's Siding on the North-Eastern Railway Company's branch-line from Middlesborough to Guisborough, about one mile and three-quarters from the former town. Its descent was witnessed by W. Ellinor and three plate-layers, who heard a whizzing or rushing noise in the air, followed in a second or two by a sudden blow of a body striking the ground not far from them; the spot was found to be 48 yards from where they stood. The fall took place at 3.35 P.M. on the 14th March, 1881. No luminous or cloud-forming phenomena are reported. According to Prof. Alexander Herschel, who at once visited the spot, the fall appears to have been nearly vertical. The stone was "new-milk warm" when found, and weighed 3 lb. 8¼ oz.; the crust is very perfect and of an unusual thickness, and has scarcely suffered by the fall. The stone forms a low pyramid, slightly scolloped or conchoidal-looking, 6¼ inches in length, 5 inches wide, and 3 inches in height. The rounded summit and sloping sides are scored and deeply grooved, with a polish like black lead in waving furrows running to the base, showing that this side came foremost during the whole of the fusing action of the atmosphere which the meteorite underwent in its flight. The base is equally fused by heat, but is rough, dull brown in colour, and not scored or furrowed. The stone penetrated the soil to a depth of eleven inches. From experiments made by Professor Herschel. he calculates that it struck the ground with a velocity of 412 feet per second. As it would acquire this velocity by falling freely through half a mile, it is evident that little of the original planetary speed with which it entered the atmosphere can have remained over.