An estimated four hundred people were on board the Princess when it pulled out into the current of the river after 9 a.m. Because the boat was late, high boiler pressure had been maintained during the stop, and second engineer Peter Hersey was reported to have declared that he would make it to New Orleans on time if he had to blow her up. As a portent of the looming catastrophe, the Mississippi River was veiled in a dense fog. "The boat had a legal carrying capacity of 376 passengers," he says, "and on its up-river trip it had over 2,500 aboard," in part because the government had agreed to pay $5 for each enlisted man and $10 for each officer who made the trip. 2012 was additionally when the river was low sufficient to expose five steamboat wrecks along the Missouri River between St. Charles and Bridgeton. "He told the captain and the chief engineer the boiler was not safe, but the engineer said he would have a complete repair job done when the boat made it to St. "He served in the 23rd Arkansas Cavalry, and he was tasked with, among other things, raiding ships going up and down the river," Frank Barton says. Catchers once in a lifetime lunge saves Cardinals, The world watches (and makes donations) as St. Louis bald eagle raises eaglet from a rock, Governor threatens to keep Missouri lawmakers in session over transgender rules, Barat Academy in Chesterfield to close after years of financial troubles, Four young people die in Old Monroe head-on crash, Court records online include private information for thousands of Missouri residents, Archdiocese releases third draft of proposed changes to St. Louis parishes. Near midnight, Sultana left Memphis, leaving behind about 200 men. Get up-to-the-minute news sent straight to your device. He ordered the engines reversed, but the drifting boat smacked into submerged rocks near Grand Tower Island, opening a gash on its port (left) side. An estimated 1,800 people died in the explosion and ensuing fire more than died in the sinking of the Titanic. While wealthy patrons might buy drinks all night at the bar, the bar was usually privately owned, with just a share of the profits going to the steamboat captain and/or owner. At around 2:00AM on April 27, 1865, when Sultana was about seven miles (11km) north of Memphis, its patched boiler suddenly and violently exploded, killing 400-500 men instantly. Fire broke out and began to consume the remains. 1 was no longer used to manufacture boilers after 1879. Early western river navigation was always dangerous, but it was a necessity in order to ship supplies to U.S. Army frontier posts and civilian settlements. The Nick Wall, named for a noteworthy Missouri River riverboat captain, was a 338-ton sternwheel paddleboat built in 1869 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Explosion of the Oronoko, April 21, 1838, near Princeton, Mississippi. Through the corruption of Captain Reuben Hatch, a Union officer at Vicksburg, Mississippi, and the captain of the Sultana, James Cass Mason, those 2,000 ex-prisoners were crowded onto a boat with a legal carrying capacity of only 376 passengers. [citation needed], By the mid-1920s, only a handful of survivors could attend the reunions. Barges still carry some goods on the river, but trains and trucks carry most of the freight in America. The steamboat sank shortly after it struck submerged rocks at 2:20 a.m. All 91 passengers and crew members reached the island by gangplank, and were rescued later that day by a towboat. The lure of huge profits led steamboats to travel in unsafe river conditions and at unsafe speeds. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2007. Although the mechanic wanted to cut out and replace a ruptured seam, Mason knew such a job would take a few days and cost him his precious load of prisoners. Everyone escaped to the muddy, isolated safety of Grand Tower Island. Probably the most interesting of the wrecks are Vessel No. The Sultana made it only a few miles north of Memphis. [4]:72 Sultana subsequently arrived at Memphis, Tennessee, around 7:00 PM, and the crew began unloading 120 tons (109 tonnes) of sugar from the hold. The last northern survivor, Private Jordan Barr of the 15th Michigan Volunteer Infantry Regiment, died on May 16, 1938, at age 93. Newspaper accounts indicate that the residents of Memphis had sympathy for the victims despite the ongoing Union occupation. It just hurts my heart. GRAND TOWER, ILL. It was the first trip of the season for the Golden Eagle, an antique steamboat with twin stacks, gingerbread woodwork and a splashing sternwheel. Some survivors were plucked from the tops of semi-submerged trees along the Arkansas shore. ", Ancestry.com, Texas Death Certificates, 19031980, Jennings, Pat "What Happened to the Sultana? The First Bridge Over the Mississippi and the Effie Afton The Capt. On April 27, 1865, a steamboat named the Sultana exploded and sank while transporting Union soldiers up the Mississippi. Marion, across the river from Memphis, Tenn., is near the spot where the 260-foot side-wheeler came to rest. THIS DAY IN HISTORY - Union soldiers die in steamship explosion - 1865 "A few weeks earlier, he might have been attacking the Sultana if it had come in.". [22], In 1903, another person reported that Sultana had been sabotaged by a Tennessee farmer who lived along the river and cut wood for passing steamboats. (Post-Dispatch), The Golden Eagle heads downstream at St. Louis on May 14, 1940. The report blamed quartermaster Capt. hide caption. During the Civil War steamboats carried Iowa soldiers, weapons and food supplies to army posts. [33] The museum is only temporary until enough funds can be raised to build a permanent museum. SS Sultana:The steamboat was bound for St. Louis in April 1865 when the boilers failed right above Memphis, 13 days after President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. After some time, the weakened twin smokestacks fell; the starboard smokestack fell backward into the blasted hole, and the port smokestack fell forward onto the crowded forward section of the upper deck, hitting the ship's bell as it fell. The museum also features many artifacts from the Sultana Survivor's Association, as well as a fourteen-foot model replica of the boat. "I understand that the Fogelmans were able to put together some logs to make a raft and go out and take people off the boat as it drifted back this way," Fogelman says. [4]:33,3435,38,4041, While the paroled prisoners, primarily from the states of Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia,[4]:226290 were brought from the parole camp to Sultana, a mechanic was brought down to work on the leaky boiler. Given as the "John Lithoberry Shipyard" on Ohio Historical Marker 1831 (1999) on the Ohio River at Sawyer Point. What effect did steamboats and travel on the river have on the development of Iowa? Mississippi River Shipwreck Exposed by Drought as Water - Newsweek Steamboat - Wikipedia 2), built in 1860 but coming downriver on her maiden voyage after being refurbished,[6] arrived at about 2:30 AM, a half hour after the explosion, and rescued scores of survivors. hide caption. [19][20] Thomas Edgeworth Courtenay, the inventor of the coal torpedo, was a former resident of St. Louis and was involved in similar acts of sabotage against Union shipping interests. Most river travel was between the years of 1846 and 1866. Why should potential readers care? The disaster of the Princess near Baton Rouge in 1859 was a tragically typical example. Steamboat Accidents on the Mississippi River by Sara Mayer - Prezi The forward part of the upper deck collapsed onto the middle deck, killing and trapping many in the wreckage. Who Was John Wilkes Booth Before He Became Lincoln's Assassin. The train . Explosion of the Steamboat Constitution, May 4, 1817, Point Coupee, Louisiana. "The Arabia sank. ", Jerry Potter, lawyer and author of The Sultana Tragedy. BNSF said in a statement that two of . An engraving of the Sultana explosion, published in Harpers Weekly, May 20, 1865. The name stuck. Poster: Shows location of 31 steamboat sinkings on Mississippi River between Trempealeau, WI and Victory, WI (many boats were recovered and refitted). In the early 1900s, the Mississippi River shifted about two miles to the east, leaving the wreck under about 15 feet of Arkansas soil. [4]:2931, Leaving Vicksburg, Sultana traveled downriver to New Orleans, continuing to spread the news of Lincoln's assassination. Highlights of the Mississippi River Cruise: Round-trip from New Orleans Length: Five days Price: Starts at $2,405 per person Enjoy a complimentary overnight in New Orleans before embarking on. History of steamboats on the Mississippi: Lloyd's Directory of Disasters. By that standard, the loss of the Golden Eagle was a minor event. The early morning of May 18, 1947, was dark but quiet, the Mississippi River 10 feet below flood stage. A crew member fished liquor bottles from the half-flooded bar. Golden Eagle's pilot house was salvaged. In his book River of Dark Dreams, historian Walter Johnson writes that the table of contents of Lloyds bestseller was sort of a nightmare poem of alphabetized Americana: a catalog of 97 major and hundreds of minor boat disasters. In 1859, the Blackhawk made 29 round trips between Cedar Rapids and Waterloo on the Cedar River. The U.S. government would pay US$2.75 per enlisted man and US$8 per officer to any steamboat captain who would take a group north. As to whether it is a good thing or not, yes, I believe that it is a good thing to do so much research and get so much information from the internet. [7] Many died of drowning or hypothermia. Thousands of recently released Union prisoners of war who had been held in the Confederate prison camps at Cahaba and Andersonville had been brought to a small parole camp outside of Vicksburg to await release to the northern states. Sometimes the boilers exploded. Steamboating | Tennessee Encyclopedia "Lincoln had just been assassinated. GES: I am a bit ambivalent about that. A Look Back The day the Golden Eagle steamboat sank in 1947. FS: In the course of your story, you declare that It is now possible to write a work of historical nonfiction without ever leaving home. How do you actually feel about that? Category:Shipwrecks of the Mississippi River - Wikipedia He was a passenger on its trip to Nashville, Tenn. (Post-Dispatch), Passengers pass time on Grand Tower Island until they were picked up by a passing towboat. Further back, the collapsing decks formed a slope that led down into the exposed furnace boxes. Is it a good thing? It seemed that profit was the driving factor for most steamboat owners and captains. [24]:193197, Despite the magnitude of the disaster, no one was ever formally held accountable. Passing boats and bystanders on both sides of the Mississippi helped pull survivors from the muddy water. (Post-Dispatch), U.S. Army Corps of Engineers crews dismantle the wreck of the Golden Eagle on May 28, 1947, to eliminate its hazard to river navigation. The cost for a stateroom fare was marginal when compared to the amount that could be gained by carrying freight and goods. I think reporting was much more accurate, and less political, than it is today. Sultana (steamboat) - Wikipedia The steam packet boat is one of the most enduring and iconic images from the glory days of the Steamboat Era. One wall is decorated with the names of every soldier, crewmember, and passenger on the boat on April 27, 1865. They can search material held in small, local historical societies. The Hayne was sold in 1908 to C.J. The boat and its entire cargo was a total loss. He died in 1871, having escaped justice because of his numerous highly placed patronsincluding two presidents. Dropping water levels could cause hot spots leading to metal fatigue, significantly increasing the risk of an explosion. When the boat tipped the other way, water rushing back into the empty boiler would hit the hot spots and flash instantly to steam, creating a sudden surge in pressure. Mississippi River waters keep rising in Iowa and Illinois | KTLA No one seemed to question the danger of a steamboat race until there was an accident or the boilers exploded. "And the shrapnel, the steam and the boiling water killed hundreds.". Only six years before, it had foundered in the river near Chester, Ill., with one crew member lost. The exact number of steamboat accidents in Iowa Rivers is not known. The earliest steamboat disaster in Arkansas waters may have been the Car of Commerce, which suffered a boiler explosion north of Osceola (Mississippi County) on the Mississippi River in 1828, killing twenty-one people, while the deadliest was the loss of the Sultana near Marion (Crittenden County) on April 27, 1865, in which as many as 1,800 were That day, he says, the water was moving very quickly and contained a lot of trees and other debris. It went upward at a 45-degree angle, tearing through the crowded decks above and completely destroying the pilothouse, instantly killing Captain Mason. Unlike many of the nautical discoveries in. The few steamboats still gliding along the rivers today are usually carrying tourists on short trips. Wreck of the Montana - YouTube The steamer registered 1,719 tons[2] and normally carried a crew of 85. The broken wood caught fire and turned the remaining superstructure into a raging inferno. Explosion and Burning of the Steamboat Teche on the Mississippi River, May 5, 1825., Explosion of the Helen McGregor, At Memphis, Tennessee, February 24, 1830., Terrific Explosion of the Steamboat Ben Franklin, at Mobile, Alabama, March 13, 1836.. Miller, of Vicksburg, who changed the name to Alice Miller and ran the boat on the Yazoo and Sunflower rivers. The Eclipse was a steamboat that struck a snag on the Mississippi River near Osceola (Mississippi County) on September 12, 1925; a deckhand and a passenger lost their lives in the accident. Instead of taking two or three days, the temporary repair took only one. A couple billed as "a genuine giant and giantess" arrive in St. Louis for a visit. The Sultana tragedies seem to be classic examples of putting profit over safety. The city of Vicksburg was ravaged by the American Civil War, and so were the men who were about to board the steamboat Sultana. How do you feel about that? After the fall of Vicksburg and Port Hudson, Louisiana, in July 1863 and the opening of the Mississippi, the Sultana was used to bring cotton from parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arkansas that were now under Union control up north so that it could be sent to Eastern manufacturers that had been starving for the raw material. The Sultana Disaster | American Battlefield Trust This led to many accidents and groundings. "At 2 a.m., one of the boilers exploded, resulting in two other boilers exploding," Potter says. He is currently a freelance writer living in Annapolis. Nick Wall [Steamboat] - Encyclopedia of Arkansas Immediately, Captain Mason grabbed an armload of Cairo newspapers and headed south to spread the news, knowing that telegraphic communication with the southern states had been almost totally cut off because of the recently-ended American Civil War. Get up-close and in-depth when examining artifacts such as photographs. [21], Two years earlier, in May 1886, came a claim that 2nd Lt. James Worthington Barrett, an ex-prisoner and passenger on the steamboat, had caused the explosion. (Post-Dispatch), Capt. A series of maritime disasters, occurred over the next 120 years before the Coast Guard assumed enforcement responsibility.
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