This, the most disastrous of all calamities which ever occurred in the history of navigation in the West, commenced at about 10 o'clock in the evening of May 17, 1849, and continued until 7 o'clock the next morning. Captain Chittenden, the historian of the Missouri River, says, in describing this catastrophe:
"Fire alarms had been heard several times early in the evening, but nothing had come of them, until about the hour above-mentioned, when it was found that fire had broken out in earnest on the steamer "White Cloud", which lay at the wharf between Wash and Cherry Streets. The "Endors" lay just above her and the "Edward Bates" below. Both caught fire. At this time a well-intended but ill-considered, effort to stop the progress of the fire was made by some parties, who cut the "Edward Bates's" moorings and turned her into the stream. The boat was soon caught by the current and carried down the river; but a strong northeast wind bore it constantly in shore, and every time it touched it ignited another boat. An effort was now made to turn other boats loose before the "Edward Bates" could reach them, but a fatality seemed to attend every effort. The burning boat outsped them all, and by frequent contacts set fire to many more. These in turn ignited the rest, until in a short time the river presented the spectacle of a vast fleet of burning vessels, drifting slowly along the shore. The fire next spread to the buildings, and before it could be arrested had destroyed the main business portion of the city. It was the most appalling calamity that had ever visited St. Louis; and followed as it was by the great cholera scourge of 1849, it was a terrible disaster. At the levee there were destroyed twenty-three steamboats, three barges, and one small boat. The total valuation of boats and cargoes was estimated at about $440,000, and the insurance was but $225,000; but this was not all paid, for the fire broke up several of the insurance companies."
Ice also plays an important part in the game of steamboat killing. The season on the upper river is short at best. An early start in the spring, before the railroads had yet reached St. Paul, brought the greatest financial returns to the daring and successful captains who, bringing their boats through all the dangers, arrived safely in harbor at the head of navigation. Great chances were taken in the fifties, in trying to get through Lake Pepin before it was clear of ice. The river above and below was usually clear two weeks before the ice was out of the lake sufficiently to enable a boat to force its way through. During the last week of such embargo, boats were constantly butting the ice at either end of the lake, trying to get up or down, or were perilously coasting along the shore, where, from the shallowness of the water and the inflow from the banks, the ice had rotted more than in the centre of the lake. A change of wind, or a sudden freshening, catching a boat thus coasting along the shore, would shove her on to the rocks or sand, and crush her hull as though it were an eggshell. The "Falls City" was thus caught and smashed. I myself saw the "Fire Canoe" crushed flat, in the middle of the lake, a little below Wacouta, Minn., she having run down a mile or more in the channel which we had broken with the "Fanny Harris". We had just backed out, for Captain Anderson had seen signs of a rising wind out of the west, that would shut the ice into our track. This result did follow after the other boat had gone in, despite the well-meant warnings of Anderson, who hailed the other boat and warned them of the rising wind and the danger to be apprehended. This caution was ignored by the "Fire Canoe's" captain, who ran his boat down into the channel that we had broken. The ice did move as predicted, slowly, so slowly as to be imperceptible unless you sighted by some stationary object. But it was as irresistible as fate, and it crushed the timbers of the "Fire Canoe" as though they were inch boards instead of five-inch planks. The rending [235] [236] of her timbers was plainly heard two miles away. The upper works were left on the ice, and later we ran down and picked the crew and passengers off the wreck. When the wind changed and blew the other way, the cabin was turned over and ground to splinters amid the moving cakes.
In 1857 the "Galena" was the first boat through the lake (April 30th). There were twelve other boats in sight at one time, all butting the ice in the attempt to force a passage and be the first to reach St. Paul. Of the boats lost on the Missouri River between 1842 and 1897, twenty-six were lost from ice; on the upper Mississippi, up to 1863, ten boats succumbed to the same destroyer.
Not only in Lake Pepin, in the early spring, was this danger to be apprehended; but in autumn also, in the closing days of navigation, when the young "anchor ice" was forming, and drifting with the current, before it had become attached to the banks, and formed the winter bridge over the river. This was a most insidious danger. The new ice, just forming under the stress of zero weather, cut like a knife; and while the boat might feel no jar from meeting ice fields and solitary floating cakes, all the time the ice was eating its way through the firm oak planking, and unless closely watched the bow of the boat would be ground down so thin that an extra heavy ice floe, striking fairly on the worn planking, would stave the whole bow in, and the boat would go to the bottom in spite of all attempts to stop the leak. The "Fanny Harris" was thus cut down by floating ice and sank in twenty feet of water, opposite Point Douglass, being a total loss. Ordinarily, boats intending to make a late trip to the north were strengthened by spiking on an extra armor sheathing of four-inch oak plank at the bow, and extending back twenty or thirty feet.
It is a singular fact that the greatest damage from ice was not experienced at the far north of the upper river, but at the southern extremity of the run; although many other boats were lost on the upper reaches, at wide intervals of time and place. St. Louis was a veritable killing place for steamboats, from the ice movements. This may be accounted for from the reason that so many boats wintered at St. Louis. When a break-up of extraordinary magnitude or unseasonableness did occur, it had a large number of boats to work upon. Again, the season of cold, while long and severe on the upper river, was distinctly marked as to duration. There was no thawing and freezing again. When the river closed in November, it stayed closed until the latter end of March, or the early days of April. Then, when the ice went out, that ended the embargo; there was no further danger to be feared. Boats did not usually leave their snug-harbors until the ice had run out; and when they did start, they had only Lake Pepin to battle with. At St. Louis, on the contrary, the most disastrous break-ups came unseasonably and unexpectedly, with the result that the great fleet of boats wintering there were caught unprepared to meet such an emergency, and many were lost.
Two such disastrous movements of the ice were experienced at St. Louis, the first in 1856, the other in 1876. The former "break-up" occurred February 27, and resulted in the destruction of a score of the finest boats in the St. Louis trade, and the partial wrecking of as many more. It put out of commission in a few hours nearly forty boats, a catastrophe unequalled in magnitude, either before or since, in the annals of the river. The disaster was not caused in the usual way, by the thawing of the ice. In that case it would not have been so disastrous, if indeed to be feared at all, that being the usual and normal manner of clearing the river in the spring. The winter had been very cold, the ice was two or three feet thick, and the water very low. In this case the movement of the ice was caused by a sudden rise in the river from above, which caused the ice to move before it was much, if any, disintegrated. It was an appalling and terrible exhibition of the power of the Great River when restrained in its course. The following account is from a St. Louis paper, printed at the time:
"The ice at first moved very slowly and without any perceptible shock. The boats lying above Chestnut Street were merely shoved ashore. Messrs. Eads & Nelson's Submarine boat No. 4, which had just finished work on the wreck of the "Parthenia", was almost immediately capsized, and became herself a hopeless wreck. Here the destruction commenced. The "Federal Arch" parted her fastenings and became at once a total wreck. Lying below her were the steamers "Australia", "Adriatic", "Brunette", "Paul Jones", "Falls City", "Altoona", "A. B. Chambers", and the "Challenge", all of which were torn away from shore as easily as if they had been mere skiffs, and floated down with the immense fields of ice. The shock and the crashing of these boats can better be imagined than described. All their ample fastenings were as nothing against the enormous flood of ice, and they were carried down apparently fastened and wedged together. The first obstacles with which they came in contact were a large fleet of wood-boats, flats, and canal boats. These small fry were either broken to pieces, or were forced out on to the levee in a very damaged condition. There must have been at least fifty of these smaller water craft destroyed, pierced by the ice, or crushed by the pressure of each against the other.
"In the meantime some of the boats lying above Chestnut Street fared badly. The "F. X. Aubrey" was forced into the bank and was considerably damaged. The noble "Nebraska", which was thought to be in a most perilous position, escaped with the loss of her larboard wheel and some other small injuries. A number of the upper river boats lying above Chestnut Street, were more or less damaged. Both the Alton wharf-boats were sunk and broken in pieces. The old "Shenandoah" and the "Sam Cloon" were forced away from the shore and floated down together, lodging against the steamer "Clara", where they were soon torn to pieces and sunk by a collision with one of the ferry-boats floating down upon them. The Keokuk wharf-boat maintained its position against the flood and saved three boats, the "Polar Star", "Pringle", and "Forest Rose", none of which were injured.
"After running about an hour the character of the ice changed and it came down in a frothy, crumbled condition, with an occasional solid piece. At the end of two hours it ran very slowly, and finally stopped at half past five o'clock, P. M. Just before the ice stopped and commenced to gorge, huge piles, twenty and thirty feet in height were forced up by the current on every hand, both on the shore and at the lower dike, where so many boats had come to a halt. In fact these boats seemed to be literally buried in ice.