Thursday, January 15, 2015

Talking About Climate Change in 1827

Thursday, January 15, 2015
Mail Coach in snow
Loretta reports:

Talking about climate change in the early 1800s?  This was something of a surprise to me at first.  Then I realized that this piece was written only a decade after the Year Without a Summer, during what is known as the Little Ice Age
In that context, the theories become quite interesting.

In the discussion of cold weather in North America and Europe, you’ll notice no mention of a volcanic eruption.  And can you imagine 19th century naval vessels trying to move glaciers?* 


Climate change

Climate change
15 January entry from William Hone, The Every-day Book Vol II (1827-28).










*The asterisk in the article refers to a Morning Chronicle piece I’m unable to access.  Undoubtedly another publication—probably several—will have stolen it, but which one(s) and where will take some tracking down and may elude me altogether.



Image:  James Pollard, The Mail Coach in a Drift of Snow (1825).

Clicking on the image will enlarge it.  Clicking on the caption will allow you to read at the source, where you can learn more and enlarge images as needed.

4 comments:

Regencyresearcher said...

Ihave the Morning Chronicle and Morning Post of 1817 and will see if I can find anything. The best source would likely be an Annual Register ( many are on Google Books) for 1817 as the Registers often include articles on the weather. Then there is the society of Natural Philosophy that printed monthly weather reports. ( I think that is the name of the society. The magazine of that society is on line The weather for 1817 wil be in January of 1818.
Nancy

Regencyresearcher said...

You say the * refers to a piece in the Morning Chronicle. Do you have that date?
I found a reference herehttp://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/07/08/1815-1816-and-1817-a-polar-puzzle/
That gives a date of a comment in November 1817 by the president of the Royal Society which collected meteorological data.

Regencyresearcher said...

http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/historic_variation_in_arctic_ice/

LorettaChase said...

Interesting piece on the topic, Nancy. Thank you. Hone says 4 October 1817 for the Morning Chronicle article.

 
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