In the early nineteenth century steam-powered riverboats were the major form of transportation for people and cargos in three immense river basins in the young United States: the Mississippi River, the Ohio River, and the Missouri River. Also canals connected cities like New York and Chicago to the great river network of mid-America until railroads provided better and faster service in the mid-nineteenth century. The size of many nineteenth-century riverboats was a problem in itself. Some steamers were so long, over 200 feet, that they undulated with the waves as they traveled despite beams and braces to help keep the boat rigid. A passenger noted that you could see the wave coming down the length of the boat. The riverboats were not without risk and they often met with disaster by hitting submerged objects such as fallen trees or sandbars. Either of these hazards could break open the hull, although the sandbar in some cases only grounded the boat temporarily. The disaster most feared by the traveling public aboard a nineteenth- century riverboat was boiler explosions. The explosion of the riverboat Sultana on the Mississippi River had such a high death toll that public pressure forced Congress to enact the nation’s first transportation safety act. Author Charles Dickens visited America in 1842 and traveled by riverboat on the Ohio River from Pittsburgh to Cincinnati. As he learned more about the boats he observed, “…steamboats usually blow up one or two a week in the season.” Such knowledge, however, did not deter the number of people traveling on riverboats, or reduce cargo shipments. Boat builders valued the importance of good weight distribution. To achieve this they put the boilers near the front—the bow—and the machinery in the middle or at the stern. They attempted to stiffen the long framework of the hull with trusses and long iron rods. Unfortunately putting the boilers near the bow paved the way for death and destruction for thousands of passengers whose cabins were located on the deck above the boilers. Passengers lives were never in greater jeopardy than when they stood on the upper decks while watching workers loading cargo at a landing. Many explosions occurred at landings due to the increase of pressure when the engines were stopped. The first recorded explosion on a Mississippi River steamer was in 1816. The steam pipe on the Washington burst and nine men were scalded to death. In the following year the Constitution blew up, and thirty lives were lost. Over time a frightful toll of boats and lives occurred on steamboats. Congress began moving to regulate steamboat boilers. In 1849 a list of 233 explosions on river steamers was compiled for the purpose of informing Congress on the question of steamboat boilers. The list showed that, as nearly as could be ascertained, 2,563 lives were lost and 2,007 persons injured in the explosions, a total of 4,660. The property loss was placed at $3,090,360 (1.2 billion today). One important riverboat, the Sultana, set records when it exploded on the Mississippi River in 1865, only a few weeks after the end of the Civil War. At the time of the explosion the Sultana was carrying an estimated 2000 Union soldiers who had been held in Confederate prisoner of war camps (for comparison, the Titanic disaster took 1503 lives). Many of the returning soldiers came from Confederate hospitals or prisons in poor condition and disabled. The Sultana was docked in Vicksburg for boiler repairs when it’s Captain, Cass Mason, heard that the U.S. government would pay an attractive sum to transport soldiers ($90 each). He decided a thorough repair of the boiler would cause him to miss this opportunity, so he ordered a quick and temporary fix. In order to take maximum advantage of the government offer, Captain Mason also accepted many more soldiers than the Sultana was designed to carry. While underway one of the Sultana’s boilers exploded a few miles north of Memphis, Tennessee at approximately 2 a.m. on April 27, 1865. SOME DEVICES LEAVE A BIG GAP HERE. PLEASE SCROLL DOWN. The explosion instantly killed hundreds, especially those soldiers who had been packed in right against the boilers. Many of them died from shrapnel, steam, and boiling water released from the explosion. Those on deck either went down with the boat of jumped into the river. Those who were able grasped a scrap of a board to stay afloat, and those who knew how to swim might make it to shore or stay afloat for a few hours until the rescue boat arrived. Unfortunately there were few survivors. Among the survivors was a young soldier from Michigan named Hosea Aldrich who described the chaos and confusion after the explosion, “…the first thing that I heard was a terrible crash, everything seemed to be falling. The things I had under my head, my shoes, and some other articles and specimens that I had gathered up and had them tied up in an old pair of drawers, they all went down through the floor. We scrambled back. The smoke came rushing up through the passage made by the exit of the exploded boiler. I was pushed in the water and started for the bottom of the Mississippi, but I soon rose to the surface and found a small piece of board, and soon had the luck of getting a larger board, which was very lucky for me, as I could not swim. We floated along down the river nearly an hour I think when my limbs began to cramp; that was the last of which I was conscious until at eight o'clock a.m. We had floated down the river six miles and lodged in the flood-wood against an island which was within two miles of Memphis, and here we were picked up by the United States picket boat.” Another writer named Jerry Potter wrote: “It was a particularly bad day to be out on the water. The Mississippi River was experiencing high water levels as melting snow from up north flooded its banks. Fallen trees and other debris mixed into the fast-moving waterways. It was difficult to navigate these clogged and swirling waters come nightfall, but Captain Mason was determined to make his shipment of soldiers. Several miles from Memphis, Tennessee, one of the Sultana’s boilers exploded. Because the boat had been so packed, many of the passengers were crammed right by the boilers. The explosion instantly killed hundreds, mostly soldiers from Kentucky and Tennessee who had been packed in right against the boilers. Many of them instantly died from shrapnel, steam, and the boiling water released from the explosion. One minute they were sleeping and the next they found themselves struggling to swim in the very cold Mississippi River. Some passengers burned on the boat. The fortunate ones clung to debris in the river, or to horses and mules that had escaped the boat, hoping to make it to shore, which they could not see because it was dark and the flooded river was at that point almost five miles wide.” All these passengers aboard the Sultana were torn between two choices: stay on the boat and die from the fire or jump into the water and possibly drown. Soldiers just out of war again found themselves fighting for their lives. Fortunately passing boats and local residents began a rescue operation to save the soldiers. One local man, John Fogelman and his sons made a raft from some logs and went to the flaming Sultana to rescue passengers. They made several rescue trips back to the burning boat. One soldier from Ohio noted, “When I came to my senses I found myself surrounded by wreckage, and in the midst of smoke and fire. The agonizing shrieks and groans of the injured and dying were heart-rending, and the stench of burning flesh was intolerable and beyond my power of description.” Within a few hours the Sultana went to the bottom of the Mississippi. One curious feature of this disaster is that some of the rescuers, who were defeated Confederate soldiers only a few weeks earlier, now saved the lives of their former enemy. The cause of the Sultana explosion can be laid on Captain Mason. His neglect of equipment and refusal to make adequate repairs plus his eagerness to make a bundle of money cost many lives. Sources: Young, David. Roiling on the River. Chicago Tribune 2003. Retrieved from: https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2003-01-12-0301120511-story.html Berry, Chester D. Loss of the Sultana and Reminiscences of Survivors. Lansing, Michigan: Darius D. Thorp, Printer and Binder. 1892. Comstock, Daniel W. Ninth Cavalry: One Hundredth and Twenty-first Regiment Volunteers. Richmond, Indiana: J.M. Coe Publisher. 1890. Retrieved from https://www.gutenberg.org/files/60363/60363-h/60363-h.htm Larry Holzwarth. See 1842 America Through Charles Dickens’ Eyes. Retrieved from: https://historycollection.com/see-1842-america-through-charles-dickens-eyes/13/ Aldrich, Hosea C. and Hatch, Absalom N. Returning Prisoners of War. Michigan Family History Network. Retrieved from: http://www. mifamilyhistory.org/civilwar/sultana. 1865.
1 Comment
4/10/2023 11:12:57 am
This accident is all the more tragic because the victims were soldiers who had survived the civil war and because of the negligence and greed of the Captain. Good article.
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