Since it has snowed in Baton Rouge twice in the last two years I decided to look into the 1895 event that stands alone in Baton Rouge snow lore. Around here snow is always a magical event that turns even the biggest curmudgeon into a little child. On February 14-15, 1895 Baton Rouge received 12.5 inches of snow. That is like fairly tale stuff to someone who grew up here. This amount exceeds the next highest measured snowfall in Baton Rouge by NINE inches. During this same storm other places in south Louisiana received as much as two feet of snow. This event extended from Brownsville TX (5-6 in) all the way to Jacksonville FL. The Galveston Daily news summarized the events for their area:

There had been some hint of an unusual weather pattern developing the week before as an extremely frigid cold wave sent the mercury in Galveston plummeting to 15 degrees on February 7. The high temperature that chilly day was only 25 degrees, matching the record for the all-time coldest maximum temperature ever observed on Galveston Island.

In the next few days, temperatures gradually warmed up to near normal levels, before another strong cold front raced into the area on February 13, 1895. The new push of cold air kept temperatures below freezing all day on the 14th. In contrast to the previous blast of cold air, however, dark clouds began drifting over the area from the west and southwest as the day wore on.

Late on the 14th into early morning of February 15, huge flakes of snow began to fall so rapidly that that visibility was reduced at times to near zero and a thick blanket of snow began coating surfaces across all of southeast Texas.

By the time the snow moved out later that day, 15.4 inches of snow covered Galveston and an amazing 20 inches of snow choked Houston and Orange. As the storm moved east the snow spread across Louisiana to New Orleans and eventually to Mobile. Even more remarkable were reports of snow depths of 30 inches in southwest Louisiana near Lake Charles. (source)

Here is a listing of snowfall amounts in Texas that I was able to glean from a monthly weather report for February 1895 in the United States (source). My assumption is that there was only one significant snow event during that time frame as the numbers for these deep southern towns match the reports I have seen elsewhere. The reports are truly astonishing:

San Antonio TX -- 4.2 in
San Marcos TX (just south of Austin) -- 6 in
Stafford TX -- near Sugarland, Houston -- 20 in
Victoria TX -- 12 in
Brazoria TX - 18 in
Columbia Tx (I presume near Houston) - 20 in
Corpus Christi TX - 4.3 in
Cuero TX - 14 in
Galveston - 15.4 in
Houston - 20 in
Orange - 20 in

Still none of this holds a candle to the mind boggling 30 inches of snow that reportedly fell in Beaumont TX during the storm. (source) -- Some accounts had similar amounts falling near Lake Charles.

Here is a listing of snowfall amounts in Mississippi according to the same journal

Biloxi MS - 6.2 in
Bay St. Louis - 5.5 in
Moss Point MS - 21 in (on the Mississippi gulf coast)
Woodville MS - 5.5 in
Hattiesburg MS - 8.6 in
Leakesville MS - 8.0 in

And Alabama and Florida
Mobile AL - 6 in
Pensacola FL - 3 in
Tallahassee FL - 2 in
Jacksonville FL - trace

It appears that the snow events were not just confined to the 14-15th. During the first cold snap (Feb 7th) it seems that snow fell in St. Landry parish. We can also see that it fell over the course of 3 days in Rayne to set the Louisiana state record. From the Teche Today paper

1895
•(Feb. 7) This item from the St. Landry town of Sunset, dated February 7, appeared in the New Orleans Daily Picayune on February 8:
“At 7 o’clock last night a very heavy gale from the northwest struck this place and by 4 o’clock this morning a blizzard came upon us in full force and by 9 o’clock the thermometer registered 17 degrees. There has not been the least cessation in the occurrences of the wind and everything is frozen tight all day with prospects of a very severe night.”
•(Feb. 13) Fourteen inches of snow fell at Lafayette.
•(Feb. 13-15) Twenty-four inches fell at Rayne, still a state record for Louisiana.
The Lafayette weather form for February 1895 carries this note: “Snow began falling on the night of the 13th –stopped before daylight – began again about 6:30 a.m. on the 14th and kept up until about 10 a.m. on the 15th, about 14 inches of snow fall.”
Lake Charles resident F. V. Gallaugher recalled in a memoir: “The St. Valentine’s Day snow of 1895 lasted for three days and two nights. I was 15 and the snow was up to my knees.”(source)

The most interesting thing about this event is that places closer to the coast seemed to get the most snow. With recent events higher snowfall totals were further north as you would expect. That it happened the other way around speaks volumes of the penetration of the cold air for this event.

Here is an image of snowfall totals for the month of February 1895 in Louisiana. The snowfall for the month is on the far right. All of the south Louisiana totals happened during this event:


Snow in Houston


Snow in Galveston


Snow in New Orleans


The journal also produced a map of snowfall for the United States that month.