RICHMOND, VA. ? Flooding touched off by the remnants of Tropical Storm Gaston left at least five people dead Tuesday in Virginia and devastated a historic Richmond neighborhood that was the heart of the Confederate capital during the Civil War.

In the city’s hard-hit Shockoe Bottom district, dozens of cars that had been carried off by the raging floodwaters were strewn about the streets, which were caked with mud and scattered with bricks and other debris. Numerous businesses and apartments were flooded. A produce truck lay overturned. A brick building had collapsed onto several vehicles.

Residents and city officials described a scene of terror as floodwaters fed by a foot of rain swept through the low-lying area on Monday, reaching depths of up to 10 feet. Rescue crews helped lift passengers out the windows of a marooned bus, and panicked motorists raced to escape their cars as the floodwaters engulfed them.

City officials closed off 20 blocks of the Shockoe Bottom district — or about half of the historic area — near the James River, declaring them off-limits until the buildings can be inspected to make sure they are safe.

Officials said that the damage would easily be in the millions of dollars but that it was too early to provide an estimate.

The storm surprised meteorologists, who had forecast no more than 4 inches of rain. But the system parked itself over the Richmond area for several hours. Northeast of the city, rural King William County received 14 inches, the National Weather Service said.

“This truly was an act of God,” the governor said.

In the 19th century, the Shockoe Bottom district was a thriving industrial center of tobacco warehouses and factories, most of which was reduced to smoldering ruins after the city fell to Union troops in 1865. Abraham Lincoln walked through and surveyed the damage.

A floodwall built in the 1990s protects shops, restaurants and homes, but it was designed to hold back the James — not a sudden deluge from the sky.

Medical College of Virginia student Brian Suddarth talks with his insurance company as he surveys the damage to his automobile after it was washed away in a mudslide caused by heavy rains from Tropical Storm Gaston in Richmond, Va. Suddarth found the car Tuesday several hundred feet from where he had parked it Monday.

Meanwhile in the Caribbean, Hurricane Frances grew to a Category 4 storm with 140 mph wind Tuesday as it headed past Puerto Rico on a course that could bring it ashore in hard-hit Florida or somewhere else in the Southeast this weekend, the National Hurricane Center said. A hurricane warning was issued for the southeastern Bahamas.

Officials said the storm was to be about 700 miles southeast of Miami by this morning.

“We are expecting it to make landfall as a major hurricane,” said Max Mayfield, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami-Dade County. “Treat this with all the respect you can.”