April 16, 1879 Russell-Lee County Tornado 

From The Paducah Daily News, Paducah, Kentucky, April 21, 1879, pg. 2:

      The Southern Cyclone.

Atlanta, Ga., April 18. – The late cyclone in Alabama fortunately swept through a thinly settled region, but did great damage in Lee county. It destroyed scores of farm houses, sweeping them away like chaff. Enormous trees were uprooted and whirled off. Two persons were killed on Mr. Smedley’s plantation and others are known to have been injured. In one case a woman was picked up and carried bodily nearly a hundred yards. The accompanying rain and hailstorms washed out the crops terribly and did immense damage. The weather was bitterly cold and it is feared that the fruit crop is gone. The cyclone spent its force in South Carolina, skipping almost entirely over Georgia, levelling only a house here and there in this State.