Lake Ontario Maritime History

Rochester Democrat & Chronicle,  Sunday Nov. 27, 1921 Freighter Goes Down With Loss Of All Hands In Big Lake Storm Off Stony Point Bodies Of Victims Recovered; One Woman And Two Children Lose Lives In Ontario Tragedy    Oswego N.Y. Nov. 26.,-- Nine Persons Lost Their Lives When The Lake Steamer City Of New York Sank In Lake Ontario Off Stony Point In A Storm Late Yesterday Four bodies Recovered Five bodies-one woman and four men-were picked up by the steamer Isabella H. At 8 A.M. today and brought here. The bodies were found in a yawl belonging to the City of New York. Near by another boat bearing the steamer’s name was drifting but it was empty. This boat undoubtedly was the one in which Captain Harry Randall, master of the ill-fated steamer. His two boys and a member of the crew, sought safety when the steamer went down. It is believed they were washed from the boat. The dead are: Captain Harry Randall, Seeley’s Bay Ontario Mrs. Harry Randall his wife Two c...

  [From the Oswego Palladium, Tuesday, September 2, 1890]                           Remarkable Recollections _______ Some Events in the Life History of an Oswego Man whose Record is Now Closed. ______    William T. Barnes, of Oswego, who expired at the age of 83 years in the Barley city Monday, had a history closely allied to matters regarding early navigation on the lakes and the St. Lawrence. He was aboard the Sir Robert Peel when she was attacked, saw the Britishers take Windmill Point, near Prescott, and superintended the construction of the machinery for the first steamer to run Galloup Rapids. He was born at Pompey Hill, Onondaga county, N.Y., May 21st, 1807. He commenced learning blacksmith's trade in his native village, but having a desire to become a machinist went into the employ of Avery, Scoville & Lynds, of Syracuse. This enterprising firm had commenced the manufacture of engine...

Articles with the headline “An Old Tar’s Twister ” Oswego Palladium, Jan. 6, 1877 The speed of Vessels Twenty-Five Years Ago A Miraculous Escape From Drowning It was a dark stormy night—the wind howling its loudest and shrillest from the northwest, a good night for a yarn and it was evident from the frequency with which the ancient mariner scratched his poll and expectorated highly colored saliva that while the quid was being rolled from side to side, his brain was in the trough of bygone days and was tossed like a cockle shell in the breaker. The silence had grown to be almost unbearable when the old tar threw away his quid, bit off a fresh piece of navy and looking around the party a waiting his "twister," opened his budget and relieved himself of the following: "Many wonderful things happen at sea, and in my time I have seen things on the lakes that you wouldn't believe if it wasn't I, a man of veracity, told you. In 1852 I was mate on a little clipper hailing...

Syracuse Post-Standard June 12, 1940 Wayne Brewster, 91, Recalls Life as Sailor on Schooners in Bustling Trade on the Lakes ____     CAPE VINCENT - Sailing as a crew member upon the schooners that plied from Lake Ontario to Chicago in the busy years of inland water traffic following the Civil War, Wayne B. Brewster, 91, finds, in retrospection that the early years of the enlarged Welland Canal brought a period of danger through the trend of masters to overload their craft and take full advantage of the greater depth.[Note 1]     The canal boat had acted as a regulator upon cargoes. If loaded to a point where draft was increased beyond normal, even the small ships of that time could not pass. "After they enlarged the canal, they used to overload the boats," Mr. Brewster declared, recalling an experience when the schooner on which he sailed was over laden and the captain, encountering heavy weather, solemnly promised to do so no more.     Mr. Brewster can cal...

            Biography of Captain Augustus R. Hinckley                 By Richard Palmer It was eight days before Christmas, 1902. The steamer HINCKLEY had been fighting her way through a blinding Lake Ontario snowstorm for hours, returning from Cape Vincent to her home port of Oswego. No land, beacon, or buoy pointed the way; on every side, there was only whiteness. Even before HINCKLEY had cleared the Cape Vincent breakwater, the storm had been raging, and heavy seas buffeted her as she steamed southward. With only a compass to determine the course, and an approximate knowledge of his ship's speed, the captain guided his boat by "dead reckoning", and the crew prayed that his accuracy would bring them safely through the storm. Quite suddenly, the seas calmed and the steamer brought up against a mountain of ice. Startled but undaunted, the captain held the bow of his craft against the ice while one of the men scaled it...