Muscogee County GaArchives Photo Place.....Steamboat George W. Miller ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Christine Thacker http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00033.html#0008100 May 5, 2007, 11:05 pm Source: Sesquicentennial Supplement III, Ledger-Enquirer Photo can be seen at: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/muscogee/photos/steamboa12717gph.jpg Image file size: 197.3 Kb Steamboats Were Area’s Workhorses and Toys By Ralph Willingham Ledger Staff Writer Had it not been for the Chattahoochee River and the steamboats it carried, Columbus might never have become a commercial way station. Even in its infancy, Columbus was trying to get the railroads to make tracks for the Valley area, and the efforts kept failing. All this time, river craft kept the local commerce flowing. The advantages of locating the community on the Chattahoochee were obvious from the beginning. The river was fine for boating, and there was good reason to foresee rapid growth and extensive trade. Until 1828, the area's trade by wagon and by the river was extensive, reaching from Apalachicola to Heard, Carroll and Fulton counties. Then the steamboats came. In March 1828, before the town was organized, a captain docked his craft for a week or 10 days. and after making some repairs he arranged a pleasure cruise to Woolfolk's Mound. Though this was only a 10 mile trip, going upstream against the strong current was considered quite a feat. In fact, it was too much of a feat. After a while, the captain said he couldn't make headway against the current, and many passengers wound up walking home. Regular navigation of the river was uncertain at first. The boats appear to have been too big for early fall or late spring navigation. But trade began quickly. On May 25, 1829, the steamer Virginia arrived after a 38-hour run from Apalachicola. She came again on Dec. 28 and took on 400 bales of cotton earmarked for New Orleans. The real excitement came in January 1831, when the Georgian, a steamboat owned by a Columbus company, steamed to the wharf. She carried more than 1,000 barrels of freight and was towing the barge Mary Jones, which carried 700 barrels. Cannonfire saluted her on arrival, because the occasion signaled that the community had joined the "competition in boating." Five other boats traveled the river that year and were met by dray-lines, which brought them their return cargoes. By 1846 there were 11 steamboats on the river and 52 merchants advertising in the Columbus newspaper. The boats would carry cotton, iron and cotton products, plus produce from 40 miles each side of the Chattahoochee. They would come back with naval stores, cypress lumber and shinges, oranges, fish, oysters and honey" It wasn't all work. Some boats could carry 30 or 40 passengers, besides the freight. The cabins were comfortable and the dining and lounging salons were lavishly decorated. Negro cooks prepared food on the 5 1/2 -day trips from Columbus to Apalachicola. Columbus' pioneer in ship-building was Henry T. Hall, a transplanted Bostonian who was determined to make the town a ship--building center. He wanted to make the South and Southwest Independent of Pittsburgh, which he called "an abolition nest." Hall had his own boat, the Lowell, built in Pittsburgh in 1843 especially for navigation on the Chattahoochee. The side wheeler had a keel 165 feet long. The deck was 175' x 26'. It had two cylinders, 19 Inches in diameter, with a six-foot stroke, and three boilers. The Lowell could carry 1,800 bales and 50 passengers. There were 43 employees, and the payroll was $472 a week. The Lowell sank two years after it was built. This wasn't unusual, because the river was full of snags and boats struck them often. But Hall continued to promote local ship-building. One of the two worst tragedies in steamboat history struck the Rebecca Everingham on April 4, 1884. About 4 a.m. a fire swept the steamer, burning to death eight persons. Col. W. S. Shepherd, who boarded the Columbus-built boat at Shepherd's landing, saved an untold number of lives. The boat had been the pride of the river for Columbus, built in 1880, 142 feet long with a beam of 28 feet. That same year, the George W. Wylly steamer hit a pier of the Fort Gaines bridge and sank, taking the lives of 18 passengers. Columbus was just a footnote in Civil War navigation. The Confederate Naval Works built and furnished two gunboats for the Confederacy In 1864, but one sank and the other, the Muscogee, was burned by Federal troops. The same year, the new steamer Shamrock, built entirely at Columbus, left the city on her first Chattahoochee voyage. Eight other steamers were running almost daily between Columbus and Chattahoochee early in 1865, See STEAMBOATS, Page S-19 Continued From Page S-18 despite the Federal blockade. One of the government service boats which brought goods to Columbus was commanded by Capt. A. O. Blackmar, founder of the Merchants & Mechanics Bank. He also brought provisions for the Northern soldiers at Andersonville, and he boasted that they were better fed than the Southern soldiers. For many years there were as many as four competing steamboat lines. In 1894, for instance, they were the Central Line, with three boats leaving on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays; Columbus and Gulf Navigation Co., launching the steamer Fannie Ferne each Thursday; People's Line, with Saturday excursions; and Merchant and Travelers Line, leaving on Thursdays. L. A. Chitwood used to advertise "delightful boat excursions" in The Columbus Enquirer around 1908. Tuesday and Thursday night, the steamers would leave the wharf at 7:30 and return at 11. Sunday afternoon trips lasted from 3 to 7. Chitwood charged adults 50 cents and children 25 cents. The W. C. Bradley Co., whose Front Avenue business is still located by the river, got started in 1885 and used steamboats for shipping cotton and other goods. "In those days the roads were not developed and they had to depend on the river for shipping most products," recalls D. Abbott Turner, son-in-law of the company's founder. "Then they got highways and automobiles, and the business left the river because of the uncertainty about it." Turner was responsible for operating the Bradley owned Merchants and Planters Steamboat Co. from 1918-1922. He said that he "hated" the job, partly because of the setbacks the Chattahoochee caused. The river was full of snags, and only a pilot who knew where they were could navigate without hitting one and sinking. Plenty of them did, and Turner was only too glad to get rid of the responsibility. In 1923 Columbus city officials announced their interest in acquiring a line of steamboats. "I walked into his office and said, 'Mr. Bradley, let's give the steamboats to the Chamber of Commerce.' He said, 'Go ahead,' " Turner recalls. The city was grateful for the donation, but it did little good. The three remaining Bradley boats and two barges broke loose from their moorings one day, drifted down the river and finally hit snags and sank. That was the end of the Columbus steamboat business. Turner says the Bradley firm used to run pleasure excursions to Apalachicola for those willing to pay for them. The boats would leave about 9 Tuesday morning and return some time Friday night. Turner never cared for steamboat travel himself even though Henry T. Hall, the man who built the Lowell in 1843, was his wife's grandfather. He does have a souvenir, though - the anchor of the Lowell, which he found partially submerged one day in the Chattahoochee. Special Sesquicentennial Supplement III Ledger-Enquirer, Sunday, April 30, 1978, pages S-18 File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ga/muscogee/photos/steamboa12717gph.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/gafiles/ File size: 8.2 Kb