The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1901-07-29

vertisement to read that 1t would
leave at two to five minutes past two
which measure was adopted to pre-
vent the reckless destruction of their
property" while the naively simple
Vanderbilt prated about vindication at
law. The fact seems to be that the af-
fair was part of the harassing tactics
which We're determining the question of
survival between home concern and
a rich man of another state" But
the correspondence it evoked is inter-
esting qs showing by what pathos
steamboat captains are moved.
The Vanderbilt boats remained four
years in the river, but here and else
where their controlling proprietor re-
| ceived some hard knocks, such as dis
asters to his bottoms, and eventually
| he snapped steamboats, for rails.
on October s, 1886, it was announced
that the Lexington had been with
drawn and put on the Providence line
The statement seems to have been pre-
| mature and the boat continued till nav
igation closed in December. Afterward
she seems to have drifted to the Ston-
ington line, and on fierce winters
night, off Bridgeport, was burned with
| the loss of one hundred and twenty of
the one hundred and twenty four per-
! sons on board, the most fatal disacter
| in the annals of the Sound. The New
| England met misfortune while on the
Hartford line in 1888. She had raced
the steamer Boston Of the Providence
line, from New York, and when eight
miles up the river off Essex, of ter
ribly rainy night, both boilers exploded.
OF nearly one hundred persons on
board thirteen were killed and twelve
injured, of whom four seem to have
died of their hurts Chief Justice Mar
shall died in July, 1885, and about that
time his namesake boat seems to have
gone into apogee, for she was posted to
be sold on August 5, 1885, with or with
out her boilers, as she lay on the beach,
half a mile east of New Haven light.
With the elimination of competition
and the better understanding of steam
navigation, the passage to New York
by boat became less adventurous, but
still it has been marked by not few
accidents; and the Connecticut river
for such a placid water, has a. remark
able tale of shipwrecks Thus a paper
of December 2, 1887, records three sail
ing vessels wrecked few days previ-
Gus in the river one Of which, a
schooner, was loaded with onions and
cider from Wethersfield
UP-RIvER NAVIGATION.
Hartford has been designated in the
school Biographies as the head of
sloop navigation, distinction which
has been so tiresomely insisted on that
the vulgar have called the city "Sloop
Vile" Formerly, however, there was
considerable up-river navigation, and
in an imprint of 1886 I read about the
loss of a freight boat off Enfield. Such
tales have flavor of romanticsm
now, so long it Is since the lubberly
up-river fleet had reality. In 1881 it
was announced with much gusto that
the Connecticut river was navigable
for two hundred miles from it's mouth,
and great hopes were expressed of the |
Of this fact The John |
had pushed as far as Wells |
river, and it was projected soon to have |
a number Of boats operating in those |
waters In 1S43 boats left Hartford for
Springfield at 1880 a. m. and. 2 p. m.
daily, touching at Windsor Locks,
Warehouse Point and Thompsonvile.
Freight boats ran to Northampton /
South Hadley Greenfield, Brattleboro
adm Hadley. In the old days the up
river boats had been Of small tonnage
and had to be poled over the rapids at
but in 1929 the Windsor Locks
canal was opened and the twelve-ton
fiat boats were succeeded by boats of
sixty tone.
THE PENNINGTON CANAL.
In 1886 the Pennington canal was
opened with much demonstration and
he Hartford merchants found them
selves meeting the New Haven mer-
,hants in competition at Northampton.
Not long ago, perhaps now, the pas
senger through Pennington and Avon
night see some remaining embank-
nents and aqueduct piers of this old
waterway, and l can remember when
is dis-seizor, the New Haven and
railroad was commonly
Known as the Canal road" All that
lybrid navy which penetrated these In
and waters has long ago passed into
e locker of Davy Jones or whoever he !
)e tndL nOluE the TeVeTSlOH OIL SuCH
COWS; but the ghost of those old boats
till hovers, as bugbeam to enterprise,
long their former cruising ways Con- ]
congressional representation
lever awakes to such vigorous and t
irile demonstration as when a Massa- |
husetts member tries to pipe share I
f river and harbor appropriation for +
the upper Connecticut. And c
he same unquiet spirit has inconsis- +
emily cast it's spell upon the railroads S
yhich caused it's disemdomiment, its c
,test animadversions concerning up 1T
ver rivalry being matter of very re-
ant and very public record. t
There is not to-day canal or canal
led river in commercial use in this u
ate and the Connecticut river, ex- /
ept for the operations of single COM !
any, is abandoned. The old steam :.
Dat landing at the foot of Talcott r
rect, the docks and warehouses from Y
.ate street to the bridge which We're