1844
1844: At 20:00, the steamer ROCHESTER left Rochester, NY, for Toronto, ON. She encountered a severe gale about halfway there. Captain H.N. Throop had the vessel put about to return to Rochester. The gale was so severe that all thought they were lost. When they finally arrived in Rochester, the passengers were so grateful that they had survived that they published a note of gratitude to “Almighty God and Captain Throop” in The Rochester Daily Democrat on October 19, 1844 — it was signed by all 18 passengers.
1869
1869: GERALDINE (three-masted wooden schooner; 232 tons; built in 1856 at Wilson, NY, as a bark) was carrying coal from Buffalo, NY, to Detroit, MI, in heavy weather. During the night, she collided with the schooner E.M. PORTCH about 5 miles below “The Cut” at Long Point on Lake Erie and sank in 5 minutes. The PORTCH stood by while the GERALDINE’s crew got off in the yawl. No lives were lost.
1876
1876: The schooner R.D. CAMPBELL filled with water and capsized on Lake Michigan about 10 miles from Muskegon, MI. The crew clung to the vessel’s rigging until rescued by the tug JAMES MCGORDAN. The schooner drifted to the beach some hours later.
1896
1896: AUSTRALASIA (wooden propeller bulk freighter; 282 feet; 1,829 gross tons; built in 1884 at West Bay City, MI) was carrying 2,200 tons of soft coal when she caught fire, burned to the waterline, and sank 3 miles east of Cana Island in Lake Michigan. The U.S. Life-Saving Service in Baileys Harbor, WI, saved her crew.
1905
1905: The schooner TASMANIA became waterlogged while under tow of the steamer BULGARIA and sank in the Pelee Passage.
1910
1910: Tragedy struck on the WILLIAM C. MORELAND’s fifth trip. Loaded with 10,700 tons of iron ore from Superior, WI, bound for Ashtabula, OH, the vessel stranded on Sawtooth Reef off Eagle Harbor, MI, on Lake Superior. Visibility had been very limited due to forest fires raging on the Keweenaw Peninsula, and the lake was blanketed with smoke as far as 1 mile offshore. The MORELAND hit so hard and at such speed that she bounced over the first reef and came to rest on a second set of rocks. The stern section was salvaged and combined with a new forward section. She became b.) SIR TREVOR DAWSON in 1916 and was later renamed c.) CHARLES L. HUTCHINSON in 1920 and d.) GENE C. HUTCHINSON in 1951. The vessel was sold into Canadian registry in 1963 and renamed e.) PARKDALE before being scrapped at Cartagena, Spain, in 1970.
1911
1941: ARUNDELL had been laid up at Douglas, MI, for about two weeks when a fire broke out, destroying the iron-hulled passenger and freight vessel. Repaired, it would run for periods over another decade. In December 1911, Nessen and Kitzinger bought the hull and brought it to Manistee, MI, to be rebuilt. That never occurred, and it apparently remained at Manistee until the giant demand for bottoms caused by the Great War led to its sale to a New York, NY, operator for use as a coal barge on the East Coast. It passed Port Huron, MI, downbound on May 15, 1916, under tow. It was owned in New York, NY, documented as a barge, and dropped from documentation in 1919. It was sold in 1920 to Buxton-Wilson, Inc., operators of a small shipyard at Elizabeth City, NC, and converted to a coastal freight boat, powered by a Galusha gas producer and what was likely a Wolverine engine. A.L. Buxton formed the “Buxton Line” to operate between Richmond, VA, and Norfolk, VA, on the James River, in effect restoring the former Old Dominion service, and began February 21, 1921. The ARUNDELL, now renamed BREWSTER, joined that service in October 1921, but it and that service came to a crashing end, literally, six months later when the vessel was run down on the James near Brandon, VA, by the Wyandotte, MI-built LAKE STIRLING early in the morning on April 21, 1922, sinking the BREWSTER and taking the life of its chief engineer. The wreck was removed by the W.H. French Wrecking & Dredging Company of Norfolk in August.
1911: On this day (October 18) in 1911, the SS CHIEF WAWATAM went into service, transporting railroad cars and motor vehicles across the Straits of Mackinac between St. Ignace and Mackinaw City.
1917
1917: ABYSSINIA had been under tow of the MARUBA when both ships stranded at Tecumseh Shoal in heavy seas. The grain-laden vessels had been following the north shore of Lake Erie due to high winds when they struck bottom. The barge began leaking and was pounded apart, but there was no loss of life, and the steamer was refloated.
1933
1933: The wooden steam barge MANISTIQUE caught fire on Lake Huron, and the remains either sank or were scuttled.
1973
1973: The AGIOS ANTONIOS first visited the Seaway in 1972 and, as a.) SILVERWEIR, had come inland beginning in 1964. The ship had loaded iron ore at Coondapoor on the southwest coast of India and went aground on this date in 1973 leaving for Constanța, Romania. The vessel was abandoned as a total loss.
1980
1980: ALVA C. DINKEY departed Quebec City, QC, in tandem with her former fleet mate GOVERNOR MILLER, towed by the FedNav tug CATHY B., en route to Vigo, Spain, for scrapping.
Data from: Skip Gillham, Joe Barr, Dave Swayze, William Lafferty, Father Dowling Collection, Ahoy & Farewell II, and the Great Lakes Ships We Remember series from the Marine Historical Society of Detroit. Compiled by Roger LeLievre.