AP Success - AP European History: Frost Fairs and Environmental Change

In the December of 1672 occurred in the West of England, an uncommon kind of shower of freezing rain, or raining ice. It is recorded that this rain, as soon as it touched anything above ground, as a bough or the like, immediately settled into ice; and by multiplying and enlarging the icicles broke down with its weight. The rain that fell on the snow immediately froze into ice, without sinking in the snow at all. It made an incredible destruction of trees, beyond anything in all history. “Had it concluded with some gust of wind” says a gentleman on the spot, “it might have been of terrible consequence. I weighed the sprig of an ash tree, of just three quarters of a pound, the ice of which weighed sixteen pounds. Some were frighted with the noise of the air till they discerned it was the clatter of icy boughs dashed against each other.” Dr. Beale says, that there was no considerable frost observed on the ground during the whole time; whence he concludes that a frost may be very intense and dangerous on the tops of some hills and plains; while in other places, it keeps at two, three or four feet distance above the ground, rivers, lakes, &c. The frost was followed by a forwardness of flowers and fruits.