The Niagara River

by Archer Butler Hulbert

Owing to some change in the appointments of the Maid of the Mist which confined her landings to the Canadian shore she too became unprofitable and her owner having decided to leave the place wished to sell her as she lay on her dock. This he could not do, but having received an offer of more than half of her cost, if he would deliver her at Niagara-on-the-Lake, he determined a consultation with Joel Robinson, who had acted as her captain and pilot on her trips under the Falls to make the attempt to take her down the river. Mr. Robinson agreed to act as pilot on the fearful voyage; the engineer, Mr. Jones, consented to go with him and a courageous machinist by the name of McIntyre volunteered to share the risk with them. The boat was in complete trim, removing from deck and hold all superfluous articles and as notice was given of the time of starting, a large number of people assembled to watch the spectacular plunge, few expecting to see either boat or crew again. About three o'clock in the afternoon of June 15, 1861, the engineer took his place in the hold, and, knowing that their drifting would be short at the longest, and might be only the preface to a swift destruction, set his steam valve at the proper gauge and awaited—not without anxiety—the tinkling signal that should start them on their flying voyage. McIntyre joined Robinson at the wheel on the upper deck. Self-possessed, and with the calmness which results from undoubted courage and confidence, yet with the humility which recognises all possibilities, Robinson took his place at the wheel and pulled the starting bell. With a shriek from her whistle and a white puff from the escape-pipe to take leave, as it were, of the multitude gathered at the shores, she soon swung around to the right, cleared the smooth water and shot like an arrow into the rapid under the bridge. She took the outside course of the rapid and when a third of the way down it, a jet of water struck against her rudder, a column dashed up under her starboard side, hurled her over, carried away her smoke-stack, threw Robinson flat on his back, and thrust McIntyre against her starboard wheel-house with such a force as to break it through. The little boat emerged from the fearful baptism, shook her wounded sides, and slid into the Whirlpool riding for the moment again on an even keel. Robinson rose at once, seized the helm, set her to the right of the large pot in the pool, then turned her directly through the neck of it. Thence, after receiving another drenching from its combing waves, the craft dashed on without further accident to the quiet of the river at Lewiston.

Thus was accomplished one of the most remarkable and perilous voyages ever made by man; the boat was seventy-two feet long with seventeen feet breadth of beam and eight feet depth of hold, and carried an engine of one hundred horse-power.

Robinson stated after the voyage that the greater part of it was like what he had always imagined must be the swift sailing of a large bird in a downward flight; that when the accident occurred the boat seemed to be struck from all directions at once, that she trembled like a fiddlestring and felt as if she would crumble away and drop into atoms; that both he and McIntyre were holding to the wheel with all their strength, but this produced no more effect than if they had been two flies; that he had no fear of striking the rocks, for he knew that the strongest suction must be in the deepest channels, and that the boat must remain in that. Finding that McIntyre was somewhat bruised and bewildered by excitement on account of his fall, and did not rise, Robinson quickly put his foot on him to keep him from rolling round the deck, and thus finished the voyage.

The effect of this trip upon Robinson was decidedly marked. To it, as he lived but few years afterward, his death was commonly attributed. "He was," said Mrs. Robinson in an interview, "twenty years older when he came home that day, than when he went out. He sank into his chair like a person overcome with weariness. He decided to abandon the water, and advised his sons to venture no more about the Rapids. Both his manner and appearance were changed." Calm and deliberate before, he became thoughtful and serious afterwards. He had been borne, as it were, in the arms of a power so mighty, that its impress was stamped on his features and on his mind. Through a slightly opened door he had seen a vision which awed and subdued him. He became reverent in a moment. He grew venerable in an hour.

As an illustration of the lengths unscrupulous sensationalists will go at Niagara to satisfy the curious throngs, in September, 1883, several enterprising citizens of Niagara Falls purchased a small boat which they fitted up to represent the Maid of the Mist, and sent it through the Rapids. Men were stationed about the boat in effigy, but no human beings were allowed on board, although, indeed there were many applications for passage. The boat passed through the Gorge in good shape.

On August 28, 1887, Charles Alexander Percy, a waggon-maker of Suspension Bridge, went over the Rapids to win fame. He had conceived the idea of constructing a boat, and, having been previously a sailor he knew how to build a staunch craft. The vessel was of hickory, seventeen feet long and four feet ten and one-quarter inches wide. It had sixty-four oak ribs, and an iron plate weighing three hundred pounds was fastened to the bottom. The boat as completed weighed nine hundred pounds, and was covered with white canvas. At 3.30 o'clock in the afternoon on the day mentioned, Percy, having with great difficulty transported his craft to the old Maid of the Mist landing above the cantilever bridge, took off his coat and waistcoat, put them in a valise and stowed it away in one of the compartments. Then he sat in the middle part of the boat, which had no deck, rowed out into the Niagara, just above the cantilever, unshipped his oars and fastened them to the boat and then crawled into one of his air-tight compartments. Many people watched his white craft from the bridges and banks, but the excursion had not been advertised and many visitors to the Falls knew nothing of it. The boat shot down toward the Whirlpool. On the theory that there was an undercurrent which ran stronger than the surface current, Percy had attached a thirty-pound weight to a ten-foot line, which he threw overboard to act as a drag; this had no apparent effect; the two-mile trip to the Whirlpool occupied less than five minutes, and while the boat was submerged repeatedly, it did not turn over. When near the Whirlpool it drifted close to the American shore, Percy, thinking he was in the quiet water on the further side of the Whirlpool, stuck out his head, but closed the aperture just in time to escape a tremendous wave. The boat passed straight across the Whirlpool, and on the other side Percyl crawled out of the compartment, took his oars, and rowed leisurely around to the foot of the inclined railway on the Canadian side, where he landed, his voyage having lasted twenty-five minutes. He gave much the same account of the adventure as was given by Graham of barrel fame, and Kendall, the Boston policeman, who swam into the Whirlpool in 1886. He thought he struck rocks in the passage down, but the boat showed no marks.

Ice Bridge and American Falls.

Percy and a friend, William Dittrick, repeated the trip on September 25, 1887, through the lower half of the Gorge from the Whirlpool to Lewiston, having a thrilling experience. Dittrick occupied one of the air compartments, while Percy sat in the cockpit.