Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1894-11-15
A MARINE GRAVEYARD.
Where Many Mississippi River
Steamboats, Lie Buried
The Fatal Locality I'm Which Many Pala-
tial Steamers Went DowD-Names of
Some OF the weIl-Remem-
bcrcd Boats.

The recent discovery of sunken raft
by Mayor Walbridge in the channel of
the river above the Chain of Rocks,
saws the st. Louis Globe-Democrat.
will bring to the minds of many of our
old steamboat men the disasters that
befell the marine craft of this city in
that portion of the river now included
in the harbor of st. Louis. The char
ter harbor of the city includes that
stretch of the Mississippi river be-
tween the mouth of the Missouri and
the mouth of the Merrimac. That por-
ton of the harbor under the care and
control of the wharf and harbor COM
missioner lies between the Chain of
Rocks and the Rives des Peres. From
the upper mouth of the Missouri to the
foot of North Market street there are
now living under the silt and sands the
wrecks of over sixty boats and barges.
Many of these steamboats, were the
largest, best equipped and speediest
that ever walked the navigable water
ways of the country. They were in
reality marine palaces, such as this
generation has not seen.
Sawyer's bend was the fatal locality
where nearly all these splendid craft
foundered and settled under the shift
ing sands of the treacherous channel.
Among the boats that were lost many
now living will recall the following:
York State, Southerner, Mary Blain,
Highland Mary, Grace Darling, Allie
gheny, Federal Arch, c. BUN, 1uba,
N phil16al-
phia, Edinburg, Challenge, Moderator,
Nebraska, Sioux City, White Cloud,
Omaha. New Admiral, Geneva, Warsaw,
Empire City, Gov. Sharkey, Submarine
No. 10. Saranac No. 2, War Eagle, Ben
johnson, Gerard B. Allen, Fanny Scott,
Henry Adkins, Columbia, Silver Bow,
R. J. Lockwood, Wild Duck. Nile, Vic
toria, Champion, Blue Lodge, Calhoun,
Alma, Central City, Raven, Salvor, j. W.
Garrett, Hudson, Beaver, John 7.
Keiser. Pacific, Lulu Worth, Cornelia
and Badger State.
The above were sunk between the
years 1855 and 1888. In addition to
these there were twenty barges lost
north of Bissell's point within the same
year. No record was kept of the saw
YER or cut lumber RATS that were lost
south of Alton, but it has been estl-
mated that the aggregate value was
over a million dollars. Only two OF
the above-named boats, the Calhoun
and Alma, were raised. The bones OF
all the Others lie many feet beneath the
sands, petrifying under the action OF the
waters. The actual loss in marine
property to the merchants of St Louis
by the sinking of these boats was over
6ye million dollars. 1t is a sad COM
mentary upon the action of congress in
its failure to provide adequate means
for the removal OF the cause of these
disasters, and the general policy Of
making only dribbling appropriations
for river and harbor improvements,
that after 1860 few, if any, of these
marine palaces were replaced with
others. Many of the owners in the loss
Of this property lost not only all they
had, but also lost courage because OF
the increasing dangers to the marine
commerce of the immediate harbor of
st. Louis.
To add to the pathetic story of these
disasters, many of them fat to life, 1t
might be stated in passing that during
the period named above fifty-five splen-
did steamers were destroyed by fire
within the charter harbor OF the city.
The hulls of many of them lie just out
side of the present water line and form
the retaining dixie for the granite
wharf Many of the grandfathers and
prandmothers of to-day will remember
with varying emotions their bridal
trips on the James Howard, the Lea
yiathan, the Bismarck, the Grand Re-
public, the Carrie V. Kountz, and others
equally as grand. The upper mouth
Of the Missouri within the past forty
years, where it empties into the Mis-
sissippi, has changed its location four
or five times, and its present mouth is
several miles south of the one that ex-
lsted few years ago. Opposite these
various mouths. and for one mile south
ward, many of the disasters named
above occurred. The outpouring of the
Missouri waters was swift, the eddies
and currents were treacherous and the
snags and other distractions so numer-
Gus at that point that unusual care was
necessary in order to avoid the fatal
places.
The conditions that existed in Saw
yer's bend forty years ago exist prac-
tically to-day, and are still serious
menace to the marine commerce of the
city, with the added dangers to the
important municipal and railroad in
terests that have grown with the re-
luirements of the water supply and the
transportation demands of great me-
tropolis.
If the waters in Sawyer's bend could
be rolled backward, as the waters OF
the Red sea once were, and the sands
cleared away and the skeletons of our
former palatial steamers photographed,
what terrible object lesson would be
conveyed from a spot that is now the
most thickly settled marine graveyard
in the world.