Carol Crowson Deville

The Night Audrey Didn't Turn Carol Crowson Deville

The Night Audrey Didn't Turn is a true story of nature and man, survival and rescue, life and death. It is the story of a family caught in the grip of Hurricane Audrey in 1957 when storm prediction was unreliable and communication was limited. In June of 1957, 13-yr-old Terrel DeVille went to visit his sister, Bernella Fontenot, and her family in Grand Chenier, Louisiana. Bernella, her husband, and their five children lived on a coastal road that ran east from Cameron and Grand Chenier and ended beyond their home in grassy marshes. Like most of the residents of Cameron Parish, they went to sleep on the evening of June 26 thinking the storm, a category 4 hurricane, was approaching the coast slowly and would turn east toward New Orleans, crossing the coast sometime late the next day. During the night, the storm sped up and did not turn. By dawn, the Fontenot's only escape route was blocked, and they had no choice but to weather the storm in their house. In their survival efforts, the family was split into three groups, and those who survived would not come back together for more than twenty-four hours. This brief memoir is about the experience of Terrel DeVille as he remembers it sixty years later.