The PS Lady Elgin is accidentally rammed…
September 1860 CE
On the night of September 6, 1860 Lady Elgin had left Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from the Dooley, Martin, Dousman, and Company Dock, for Chicago, carrying members of Milwaukee's Union Guard to hear a campaign speech by Stephen A. Douglas, Abraham Lincoln's opponent, although there is no clear historical evidence that Douglas actually appeared.
Three hundred men and women had spent the day of September 7 listening to political speeches followed by an evening of entertainment by a German brass band on board Lady Elgin.
On the return trip that night, the brightly lit Lady Elgin is steaming through Lake Michigan against gale force winds when she is rammed by the schooner Augusta of Oswego.
Augusta is sailing using only a single white light, mounted on a five-foot Samson on the bow, and does not attempt, or is unable, to turn to avoid the collision in the gale.
On the morning of the collision (September 8) at 2:30 am, Augusta rams the port side of Lady Elgin, damaging her own bowsprit and headgear, while holing the latter ship below the waterline
Four years after the disaster, a new rule will require sailing vessels to carry running lights.
The Lady Elgin disaster remains the greatest loss of life on open water in the history of the Great Lakes.
Images
Wreck of the Lady Elgin Steamer. September 22 1860. Illustrated for Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper in 1860
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Northern North America
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