State of California (ship, 1878)

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State of California p1
Ship data
flag United States 48United States United States
Ship type Passenger ship
home port San Francisco
Shipping company Pacific Coast Steamship Company
Shipyard William Cramp and Sons , Philadelphia
Build number 202
Launch December 5, 1878
Whereabouts Sunk 17th August 1913
Ship dimensions and crew
length
91.44 m ( Lüa )
width 11.77 m
Draft Max. 7.43 m
measurement 2,266 GRT
Machine system
machine Steam engine
propeller 1

The State of California was a passenger ship put into service in 1879 by the US shipping company Pacific Coast Steamship Company, which was used for liner service on the Canadian and American Pacific coasts . She carried passengers and cargo from California to Alaska until her sinking in 1913 .

The ship

The 2,266-ton steamer State of California has been at the shipyard William Cramp & Sons in Philadelphia built and expired in December 1878, the hull number 202 from stack . The ship was completed in March 1879 . The iron- made hull was 91.44 meters long and 11.77 meters wide. The State of California was one of the founded in 1877 shipping company Pacific Coast Steamship Company, whose ships carried passengers and freight from California to Alaska. The seat of the shipping company and home port of their ships was San Francisco . Until its merger with the Admiral Line in 1916, the Pacific Coast Steamship Company was the leading passenger shipping company on the American and Canadian west coasts.

It was a replacement for a ship of the same name, which was built for the Pacific Coast Steamship Company in 1878 but sold to the Russian government for a large bonus immediately after completion . The shipping company then ordered an identical ship and gave it the same name. On May 8, 1879, the ship first arrived in San Francisco after a journey of 50 days and twelve and a half hours from Philadelphia . Captain JM Lachlan had commanded it on that voyage. In April 1886, the State of California collided with the schooner bark Portland and had to be repaired for 10,000 US dollars.

The State of California was known for its speed well into its late years. In 1901 she set a speed record on the route from Puget Sound to Nome that was not broken for more than a decade. In 1907 the steamer was completely overhauled by the Moran Company in Seattle and fitted with new boilers , furniture and deck equipment. Then the State of California was set on the San Francisco - Eureka - San Diego route. After the steamer Cottage City ran onto a reef at Quadra Island on January 26, 1911 and became a total loss, it was replaced by the State of California , which thus returned to the northern route.

With the expanding development of Gambier Bay in the southern Alexander Archipelago , about 90 miles south of Juneau , the shipping company decided to add this location to its route network. The Admiralty Trading Company had recently built a canning factory there, the Gambier Bay Cannery, where a stopover was made from now on. The area had never been visited by larger ships before and was hardly accessible on nautical charts .

Downfall

On Wednesday, August 13, 1913, the State of California in Seattle sailed for Alaska with 94 passengers and 52 crew members on board. On the bridge stood Captain Thomas H. Cann, Jr. Cann had been the captain of the Valencia a few years earlier on its last completed voyage to San Francisco. Due to the gold rush that broke out recently in the Chisana ( Valdez-Cordova ) area, many gold prospectors were among the passengers.

In the early morning of August 17th, the State of California drove through the narrow Wrangell Narrows. Numerous passengers came on deck to watch the spectacle. Then they returned to their cubicles. At 8:30 a.m., the ship docked at the Gambier Bay Cannery, unloaded three tons of cargo and continued its journey. Shortly thereafter, the State of California rammed an underwater rock not shown on any map in Gambier Bay at full speed. According to the circumstances, the collision was easy, there was hardly any vibration. Only a crack could be heard. But after this the ship began instantly flip side to accept because the hull was severely damaged. Many passengers were just having their breakfast, others were still sleeping in their cabins.

Captain Cann sounded the ship's whistle to alert the people of the nearby canning factory to the accident. He ordered the crew to make the lifeboats ready and tried to put the sinking ship aground on the rocky beach of Gambier Bay. However, it sank so quickly that it no longer reached the bank. Cann stayed on the bridge to the end. The radio operator, Donald Perkins, made distress calls until the chimney hit the radio room. A rush began on the lifeboats, of which only three could be made ready for sea and launched in the short time. One of them was flooded and another was still attached to its davits when the ship went down. Only one of them remained buoyant. The other boats were still flooded in their boat stations when the boat deck came under water. The State of California went under three minutes after the collision .

When a few boats from the canning factory reached the scene of the accident, Cann gave them directions as to where to find people in the water. The steamer Jefferson of the Alaska Steamship Company, which had received the SOS signal and made its way to the State of California , also took part in the rescue operation. In this way many of the castaways were saved. Cann himself made it into the lifeboat, which escaped without difficulty. The Jefferson brought 41 survivors to Seattle while ten wounded were transported to Juneau for medical treatment.

Despite the quick rescue, 25 passengers and seven crew members were killed in the sinking. The dead passengers were mostly women and children, including the wife and daughter of Edward C. Ward, a manager of the Pacific Coast Steamship Company. The head of the Pacific Coast Steamship Company's San Francisco office, Leslie Hobro, was also among the fatalities. The radio operator who did not survive was celebrated as a hero in his hometown of Berkeley . Captain Cann was also praised for his behavior and efforts to save the ship and the people. The wreck of the State of California is 73 meters in depth to position 57 ° 27 '  N , 133 ° 54'  W coordinates: 57 ° 27 '0 "  N , 133 ° 54' 0"  W .

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