Pennsylvania (ship, 1854)

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Pennsylvania p1
Ship data
flag United States 31United States United States
Ship type Paddle steamer
Shipping company St. Louis, Cairo and New Orleans Railroad Line
Shipyard Shousetown Boatyard, Pennsylvania
Launch 1854
Whereabouts Sunk on June 13, 1858
Ship dimensions and crew
length
75.28 m ( Lüa )
width 9.75 m
Draft Max. 1.92 m
measurement 486 GRT
Machine system
machine Steam engine
propeller 2 paddle wheels

The Pennsylvania was a side-wheel steamer whose steam boiler exploded on June 13, 1858 on the Mississippi River near Memphis . The ship burned down and sank , killing between 200 and 250 people according to various sources.

The ship

The wooden hull of the paddle steamer Pennsylvania was built in 1854 at the Shousetown Boatyard in Glenwillard, Pennsylvania . The 486 ton ship was completed in Pittsburgh . It was 75.28 m long and 9.75 m wide and was powered by a steam engine on two paddle wheels.

The Pennsylvania was built for the "Pittsburgh and Cincinnati Packet Line", for which it transported passengers and freight on the Ohio and Mississippi .

On November 26, 1857, the Pennsylvania collided 28 miles north of New Orleans with the steamer Vicksburg , which resulted in several months of failure for repairs. She was only able to resume her service on February 27, 1858. The ship now had a new owner, the St. Louis, Cairo and New Orleans Railroad Line. The Pennsylvania shuttled from then on between New Orleans and St. Louis on the Mississippi River.

The occupation of Pennsylvania temporarily included the young Mark Twain , at that time still under his real name Samuel Clemens. He worked as a pilot on the ship from September 27, 1857 to June 5, 1858 . His brother, Henry Clemens, was also a member of the team. Twain left Pennsylvania eight days before the explosion .

The misfortune

Explosion on the Mississippi River

On Wednesday June 9, 1858, the Pennsylvania departed New Orleans for another voyage to St. Louis. The exact information on the number of passengers and crew members varies, but one source reports that in addition to 74 crew members, 125 cabin passengers and 158 deck passengers were on board when casting off.

The ship made stops in Baton Rouge , Natchez , Vicksburg and Napoleon , where a total of 72 passengers boarded. Along with the crew, there were at least 429 people on board (some sources report up to 450 people). Most of the travelers were from New Orleans, including members of the New Orleans Opera House and some nuns from the Old Ursuline Convent.

The command was the 48-year-old experienced river captain John Simpson Klinefelter, who had been the captain of the Pennsylvania from the beginning and was also a partner in the company that owned the ship. The two pilots William T. Brown and George G. Ealer were jointly responsible for the navigation .

Around 6:00 a.m. on June 13, the Pennsylvania was about 70 miles south of Memphis when her boilers exploded from an unknown cause between Helena and Commerce at Ship Island . According to later reports by eyewitnesses, the forward superstructures blew up. Only a few passengers were on deck at the time, many were still in the lower area. Startled by the noise, numerous people streamed from the aft deck superstructure while clouds of smoke and steam enveloped the ship.

Many passengers feared that the Pennsylvania was on fire, but after a short time it was determined that it was not. Then the general excitement subsided a little. Since the boilers were destroyed, the paddle steamer drifted in the current, unable to maneuver. Captain Klinefelter then ordered the anchors to be dropped, but the water was too deep and the current too strong, so that the Pennsylvania continued to drift without propulsion and rudderless. The attempt to bring a line ashore also failed because the ship was too far from the shore.

A small yawl from a nearby dock came to the rescue of the Pennsylvania to pick up passengers and bring them ashore. A few minutes after the boat arrived, it was discovered that the Pennsylvania was on fire. Alarm was triggered. Within a very short time, the ship was on fire. Panicked passengers and crew members stormed the wooden boat, which was filled to the last seat. Captain Klinefelter jumped in too.

Since the yawl had only a few oars on board and these could not be operated properly because of the overcrowding, the occupants did not immediately manage to get away from the burning ship. Some inmates suffered severe burns. On the burning ship, many passengers still on board tried to save their luggage from the flames and threw it into the sailboat. Some inmates were injured by the heavy suitcases and boxes falling on them.

rescue

It wasn't until the current hit the stern of the boat and turned it around that it moved away from the Pennsylvania and reached a small river island called Ship Island about a mile away. The sailboat moored there. The rescued, some seriously wounded, could not reach the mainland from there and waited eight hours on the island without medical care. In addition, the castaways suffered from the blazing sun and high temperatures.

Those left behind on the Pennsylvania either suffocated in the smoke, burned or drowned after jumping off the ship.

The first ship at the scene of the accident was the steamer Imperial , which took the survivors from the island, provided them with food and medical treatment and transferred them to the ships Kate Frisbee and Diana , which took them to Memphis and New Orleans. On the way up the river, both ships tried to pull more people who had jumped off the ship out of the water.

The burning hull drifted about two and a half miles down the river, then stranded on a promontory and burned to the waterline. Not much more than the remains of the boilers and other machinery remained of the wreck.

Numerous rescued died from their injuries in the next few days, causing the death toll to keep rising. Henry Clemens, Mark Twain's brother, survived the fire but died on June 21st as a result of severe burns . The exact number of victims is not known; according to various sources and reports, it was between 200 and 250.

A survivor later testified that the machinist in charge was not at his post at the time of the explosion, but was on deck in the company of a few women. What ultimately caused the accident and why the fire spread so quickly could not be clarified.

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