The Great Storm of 1703

November 26, 1703

A hurricane-force cyclone tore across southern England, toppling the Eddystone lighthouse with its builder inside, killing eight thousand sailors, uprooting four thousand oaks in the New Forest. Defoe collected eyewitness accounts and published them as a book, inventing something close to modern journalism. Ships were driven from the Thames estuary into the fields of Kent, and the queen lost the lead from the roof of her own palace.