The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1891-07-20
A DISASTER RECALLED.
The Schooner That Sunk the Lady ElGin
Herself res to the Bottom.

The Schooner That Sunk the Lady Elgin
Herself res to the Bottom.
Buffalo Commercial
A dispatch from Cleveland in our col
ing and sinking of the schooner Colonel
Cook. of Cleveland, q short distance from
the Marblehead life-savinG station. The
riDking of schooner of this kind Is not an
event of such rare Importance as to de;
mand extended comment, but the Colonel
Cook is said TO be- the identical boat that
played q fatal part In one of the greatest
lake tragedies on record.
The Colonel Cook, if am not mis-
taKen.' said Captain DObbins of the life
saving service, lis the schooner formerly
known as the Augusta, which cOllided with
the excursion steamer Lady Elgin nearly
thlrty-One years ago OFT Waukegan In Lake
Michigan. Four hundred lives were lost
Jack Wilson, the captain of the Lady Ell
GIN, was hero of that terrible occasion.
but was finally lost with the others. 1t was
an appalling disaster, occurring in the days
when there was less attention paid to ex-
act signaling than there IS now"
The reporter was referred to others who
knew about this great disaster. One
Buffalo man, who had intended to take the
fated steamer from Chicago on the night
of Sept. Z. 1860. failed to do so, and. as he
has always alleged, through the influence
of q presentment. He had been ship
wrecked In Lake Superior. suffering there
by the loss of both feet by freezing. Still
he was evidently not born to be drowned.
Another Butfalonian recalled many of the
details which made the sinking of the
Lady Elgin so memorable.
lit was on the night of Sept. z. 1860. that
the steamer Lady Elgin, of the Lake Su-
perior line, left Chicago with some 493 per-
sons on board. of whom fifty To seventy five
were regular passeng gers and three hundred
to four hundred were excursiOnists, largely
from Milwaukee. The Union Guards. with
the Black Yagers. Green Yagers and several
fire companies, and their friends. had been
10 Chicago, and the return on
the Lady Elgin was marked by
mirth. music and dancing. This as at its
height IN the forward cabin at 23O on the
morning of the Sth. when the schooner
Augusta. in the midst of sudden rain
storm came bearing down on the steamer.
The Augusta had seen the lights of the
steamer but had miscalculated on the dis
lance and within three minutes struck the
Lady Elgin abaft the paddle box on the
port side. and In thirty minutes the Lady
Elgin went down.
1.-The two boats had become separated.
and the Augusta. which Captain Malott
commanded, lost sight of the steamer with
small boats. one holding thirteen and one
eight, were all the boats aboard, and saved
seventeen of their occupants. But the
great mass of those on the Lady Elgin. so
far as theydid not go, down in the cabin
and berths of the vessel. chung to the dec ks
and other parts of the wreckage. These
were the days of board life preservers and
many made use of the boards.
The story of how nearly two hundred of
those on the Lady Elgin flOated "A bout on
wreckaRe until they were washed near
shore and then, after hours of struggle
with the waves were drowned by the score
i'm the breakers within fifty yards of the
land is one of the narrowing features of a
terrible event. Colonel Lumsden, of the
New Orleans PIcayune. with all his family
and Herbert Ingraham. NJ. f.. proprietor of
the Illustrated London News, with q son.
were among the lost.
Captain Jack Wilson, of the Lady Ell
gin, was the hero of the occasion, from the
moment that he ordered every one from his
berth on TO the decks until, q hundred feet
from shore in the midst of wreckage and
while directing the twenty EIGHT other sur
vivOrs on the raft to beware OF the break
ers he was himself swept by irresistible
breakers into the waves and forever from
the sight of those whom his courage and
energy had saved.
Many Buffalonans will recall the dis
patches from Milwaukee, which picture
that city wrought with excitement and
then plunged In grief and shrouded in
mourning for the scores and scores of it's
dead citizens. remember that q purse
was raised for Captain Wi!son's widow and