1820 Tsunami: Camano Island, WA, United States

Reference #11938:

Told by Mrs. William Shelton:

"The bluff slid in. People at Hat Island in the early summer morning saw Camano Island bluff smoking; they couldn't see it for the smoke; and there was something black coming towards them, and then they saw it was a wave. They fled to high land.Some of the men and women, and some of the children were drowned, and they found the bodies drifting on the beach.

When the point slid, trees and everything went, killed quite a few people living on the west side of Hat Island.

Houses, not a real village, all washed off and people killed."

Mr. John Brown, Snohomish, of Sandy Point added some other details. Old Indians told him the slide was an overhang, and the fall buried hundreds who were clamming there. The wave washed over to Hat Island and drowned hundreds who ere clamming there.

...it is pointed out that the naming of known recent historical persons of one's own family gives a historical basis that cannot lightly be dismissed. The story would indicate a date of 1820-1830 for the incident.

The numbers given by John Brown could be exaggerations, but it is certain that the clam beds at Camano Head and the northern end of Hat Island always have been the most important beds in the Snohomish area. Hence, being early on summer morning before the people were all up, the casualties may indeed have been very heavy, even running into hundreds, especially at the Head itself from which there was no escape.

Reference #11939:

The accounts also mention that some flooding may have occurred at Hibolb (a larger village on the northern Everett shoreline near the mouth of the Snohomish), but if damage occurred at all, it was limited. No mention is made of the wave at other low-lying sites in the vicinity, such as Sandy Point on Whidbey Island - the closest barrier beach and marsh to Camano Head.

Although the accounts leave many questions unanswered, the following seems fairly clear. Early on a summer morning in the early 1800s, a large landslide occurred at Camano Head, carrying standing trees to the beach, and burying many people living at the toe of the bluff. The landslide sounded like thunder and created large volumes of dust. The landslide also resulted in a tsunami that traveled south toward Hat Island, washing over the barrier beach, destroying houses or encampments and drowning many people.

The accounts make no mention of ground shaking, suggesting that the landslide was not associated with a major earthquake.

The Camano Head landslide is the only known example of a landslide on Puget Sound generating a tsunami large enough to cause significant loss of life.

Reference #11942:

One of the Snohomish villages was located beneath a bluff at the southern tip of Camano Island, Camano Head. Hundreds of people probably made their home in the huge, multi-family split cedar plank houses, as the clam beds on Camano were (and are) well known for their abundance. One early summer day, just as first dawn was beginning to lighten the eastern sky, that village was destroyed.

A sound like thunder awakened the families living in the village across the water on the northwestern shore of Hat Island -- perhaps also the people at Hebolb, the major village in north Everett. Staring intently toward the source of the sound, all the Hat Island people could see was a huge, impenetratble cloud off in the distance, and then something black beneath it and growing closer. A tidal wave! Men, women, and children raced off the beach for the higher ground, but the water crashed into them and swept away its victims. Many children especially were lost to the wave.