Best of the History Guy: Maritime Disasters

[Music] foreign [Music] I have a degree in history I love history if you love history too this is the channel for you [Applause] if you're interested enough in history to be watching the history guy then my guess is you've probably heard of the sinking of the Titanic what you might not know is that the Titanic disaster was not the worst Maritime disaster in American history that actually occurred on the Mississippi River and while the story of the explosion aboard the steamboat Sultana is interesting what is maybe even more interesting is the reason that you may never have heard of it and so today we are going to remember the Sultana and her victims the Sultana was a 260 foot wooden side wheeled steam transport built by the John Luther Berry Shipyard in Cincinnati in 1862. registering 1719 tons she was intended for the Lower Mississippi cotton trade and for two years ran a regular route between St Louis and New Orleans with a regular crew of 85 and room for 376 passengers and cargo she was frequently commissioned to transport Union troops during the war in April of 1865 the Sultana was in Vicksburg Mississippi when its Captain Jay Cass Mason was approached by Lieutenant Colonel Reuben hatch the chief quartermaster of Vicksburg hatch had a deal for Mason thousands of federal prisoners who had been held at Confederate prisoner of war camps in Alabama and Georgia had been paroled and had been brought to Vicksburg the U.S government offered to pay five dollars per enlisted man and ten dollars per officer to any Riverboat Captain who was willing to take the paroled prisoners North hatch offered to promise Mason a full load of 1400 prisoners if Mason would pay hatch a kickback anxious for the windfall Mason agreed to the bribe while the prisoners were brought to the town of Vicksburg the Sultana finished her run to New Orleans and then sped back to Vicksburg but on the way one of her boilers sprung a leak anxious that a lengthy repair could cost him this valuable commission Mason settled for a temporary repair although Hatchet promised 1400 paroled prisoners a paperwork error led the union officer in charge to load the entire group 2100 paroled prisoners on the Sultana a ship built to accommodate 376 passengers significantly overcrowded the Sultana left Vicksburg on April 24th 1865. the Mississippi spring floods that year were the worst in history and sultana's boilers struggled to push the overcrowded boat up against the spring flood near 2 A.M on April 27 1865 seven miles north of Memphis Tennessee three of sultana's boilers exploded the explosion tore apart the boat men were thrown into the river the forward part of the upper decks collapsed into the exposed furnace boxes and set the boat Ablaze men jumped into the river to avoid the Flames but weakened from their time in the prison camps they couldn't fight the current and drowned a southbound steamer the Bostonian 2 arrived on scene about 3 A.M an hour after the explosion and rescued many survivors other survivors called for help as they floated by the docks in Memphis and were pulled from the Water by people there given the location of the tragedy ironically many of the survivors were actually saved by former Confederate soldiers in the end about 700 people were pulled alive from the water but about 200 of those died later from Burns and exposure Captain Mason and most of the officers of the Sultana also perished in the end the death toll was over 1700 nearly 200 more than Titanic the explosion aboard Sultana killed nearly as many Union troops as the Battle of Shiloh and in addition several women and children who were also on board also perished there is some controversy as to the cause of the explosion the official report blamed a combination of the boat being overcrowded steaming against the swollen River poorly managed boilers and the temporary boiler repair water sloshing between the boilers it created a surge in pressure that exploded the boilers it all could have been avoided had the water level in the boilers been kept higher a second theory is that the Sultana was destroyed by an act of sabotage the victim of something called a coal torpedo a special bomb desired to look like coal and go into the boilers a known Confederate agent was said to have made a deathbed confession to blowing up the Sultana while the Confederates were known to have destroyed several riverboats using these sorts of coal Torpedoes others argued that the Dynamics of the explosion aboard the Sultana indicate a boiler accident what should be more controversial is that no one was ever held accountable for the disaster the union officer who sent the 2100 prisoners from the parolee Camp was originally court-martialed for overloading the boat but the court-martial was overturned when they found out that he had been in the camp all day and didn't actually load anyone on the boat the captain who did load them in on the boat was a West Point graduate and a regular army officer and the Army was loathed to try him Captain Mason told him that the vote was overcrowded but not overloaded and insisted that he had carried this many people on the boat before Colonel hatch who hatched the entire scheme to begin with was politically connected he avoided responsibility by immediately resigning his commission and thus was no longer accountable to a military review board the Sultana was loaded with 2100 prisoners seven times the number of people that she was designed to carry and not one person was ever held accountable for that mistake Sultana survivors held reunions all the way up until 1936 when the last survivor finally died 71 years after the Sultana sunk there's several memorials and markers throughout the country to commemorate the deaths aboard the Sultana but if you've never heard of it don't be surprised even people in 1865 barely heard of it you have to understand what was going on in April of 1865. on April 9th Robert E Lee surrendered at Appomattox Courthouse five days later Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 26th the day before the Sultana disaster John Wilkes Booth the Assassin was caught and killed and that same day General Joseph Johnston surrendered the last large Confederate Army in the horrors of the war the people of America barely noticed another 1700 deaths it barely made the back page of the newspaper these were men who signed up to fight for their country they underwent the horrors of War endured the Unspeakable horrors of the prisoner of war camps and right as they had found freedom they died horribly burned to death or frozen to death victims of greed and incompetence and they were barely even noticed in their time because they weren't even the biggest news of the day and that's why it's up to us to remember the victims of the explosion aboard the Sultana [Music] Naval accident where 20 civilians were injured six people were killed two of them U.S cabinet secretaries and the president's future father-in-law you would think that if something like that happened you'd remember it but it did and not too many Americans do remember it even though it is one of the most significant events in American history and so today we are going to talk about the Princeton disaster of 1844. the Princeton was a Marvel a steam Sloop of the United States Navy she was the first U.S Navy vessel to be driven by a steam-powered screwp appeller she was the fastest ship in the fleet and one of the most advanced in the world she was designed by engineering genius John Erickson with the help of Navy Captain Robert Stockton who was a politically connected naval officer who believed in modernizing the fleet and had the political poll to pull the strings to get a ship like this built February 28 1844 the Princeton was fully outfitted and ready to sail and so she was taken on a pleasure demonstration cruise down the Potomac guests included President John Tyler members of his cabinet former first lady Dolly Madison and 200 other guests and while they Cruise they could enjoy demonstrations of the Princeton's two huge 12-inch main guns the Oregon and The Peacemaker either of which could throw a 200 pound Cannonball five miles on the last demonstration of the Day Disaster struck the breach of The Peacemaker exploded throwing shrapnel into the crowd six people were killed and 20 injured the dead included the U.S Secretary of State Abel P Upshur Secretary of the Navy Thomas Walker Gilmore and New York state Senator David Gardner father of Julie Gardner president Tyler's fiancee the cause of the accident was really jealousy while it seemed like Ericsson and Stockton were a great team in fact Stockton was jealous of Ericsson and trying behind the scenes to steal credit for many of his Innovations Ericsson had designed the Oregon and he designed it using built up construction which is a process that puts hot steel rings around the base of the gun it's being created in order to give it much more strength at the breach The Peacemaker on the other hand was made by Stockton and while he stole some of Erickson's designs he didn't understand built up construction he used cast iron and he solved the problem just by making the cast iron thicker at the breach that made a more impressive looking gun but had the problem of all cast iron Guns cast iron cannot stand the Traverse forces of the explosion simply put because of the design The Peacemaker breach was going to explode at some point because of his political connection Stockton was able to avoid responsibility in the court of inquiry and actually tried to pass blame to Erickson despite the fact that Erickson had nothing to do with the building of the gun Peacemaker Erickson was disgusted no longer trusted the Navy and the program for modernizing the Navy was halted setting the Navy back at least a decade John Erickson the greatest naval engineer of his day refused to work with the US Navy again for 17 years until he was begged to by the Lincoln Administration during the Civil War when of course he produced his revolutionary design for the USS monitor but the most immediate effect was on the presidential election of 1844 and that was because of the death of April P Upshur Upshur was a fantastic politician and he had just worked through delicate negotiations with the parties of the day the Whigs the Democrats and Sam Houston in Texas to bring Texas into the Union Texas statehood before the end of John Tyler's Administration that deal died with Upshur especially since his replacement John C Calhoun managed to alienate the Whigs that was important because Texas statehood was John Tyler's big argument for re-election and when the deal fell through his popularity declined his odds of re-election declined and he ended up not even running in 1844. but it also impacted the Democratic nomination because of upshur's death the annexation of Texas was a major issue in the campaign of 1844 and that caused the Democrats to shift away from their original favored candidate former president Martin Van Buren who opposed expansion to move to a pro-expansion candidate the Dark Horse James K Polk and that allowed the Democrats to attract the former John Tyler voters to the Democratic party and then Polk won the 1844 election against the Whig nominee Henry Clay on the issue of Texas expansion and so were it not for the explosion aboard the Princeton our 11th President James K Polk would not even have been nominated more or less elected the explosion determined the election of 1844. so how important was James K Polk well despite the fact that he only served for one term the Polk Administration was actually extremely impactful Polk's support for manifest destiny and expansionist ideas directly impacted the map of the nation through things like the acquisition of the Oregon Territory but maybe more powerfully it was his pressing for expansion and direct acts of James K Polk as president that led us to war with Mexico in 1846 and the Mexican-American War had huge impacts in both the United States and in Mexico directly through things like the acquisition of California and the American southwest the map of the United States is what it is today because of the election of James K Polk but the war with Mexico also exacerbated the sectarian divisions that would eventually lead 15 years later to the U.S Civil War Ulysses Grant who famously fought in both the Mexican War and the Civil War argued that the U.S Civil War the pivotal moment in U.S history that cost three quarter of a million American lives was the direct consequence of the war with Mexico which was the consequence of the election of James K Polk which was the consequence of the explosion aboard the Princeton in February of 1844. rarely in history has a moment one brief instant in time so profoundly impacted the direction of a people and a nation and that is why you should remember the Princeton disaster of 1844. hopefully you've never been in a shipwreck before but if you did you know the first rule of loading the lifeboats women and children first but did you ever wonder where this protocol came from well that's a great question for the history guy and so today we're going to talk about an extraordinary story of Bravery in the face of horrible circumstances in the birkenhead disaster of 1852. the birkenhead was an iron hold steam driven paddle-wheeled troop ship of the British army she was driven by two large 564 horsepower steam engines driving a pair of 20-foot paddle wheels and three sailing masts launched in 1845 she was a modern vessel larger more comfortable and faster than the typical wooden sail-powered troop chips of her time she had a top speed of 10 knots able to make the trip from Britain to the cape in just 37 days she was safe too her iron Hull included 12 airtight compartments separated by strong bulkheads named after the town in Cheshire where she was built she had a figurehead of the god Vulcan on her prow a sign of her iron build 210 feet long with a 37 foot beam she had a crew complement of 125 and room for more than 500 passengers in January of 1852 the birkenhead left Portsmouth with troops from 10 different regiments on board headed for South Africa where the troops were desperately needed as reinforcements in one of the many South Africa Border Wars she had several women and children on board families of the officers on the trip three babies were born she sailed through a strong Atlantic winter storm and yet her passage was the fastest of any troop ship to date the urgency of getting reinforcements to the frontier on February 23rd she docked in simonstown South Africa and offloaded some of the troops and families taking on coal and boarding nine Cavalry horses from the 12 Lancers she left Simon's town at about 6 PM headed for algora Bay and Port Elizabeth around the cape she had some 643 men women and children on board she was in a hurry so she hugged the coast and steamed at full speed in calm seas and clear skies she was making eight and a half knots shortly before 2 A.M the birkenhead struck a submerged Rock oft aptly named danger point near gansbaai South Africa ironically the barely submerged Rock was easily visible in rough Seas but not readily apparent in calm conditions Ensign G.A Lucas of the 74th foot just 20 years old at the time later wrote I was awakened by three distinct shocks I stood up immediately it struck me that we were stuck on a rock there was a gash in the hole seawater rushed in at least a hundred soldiers were immediately drowned trapped sleeping in their bunks ship captain Robert salmon rushed on Deck shouting orders in a clear and firm voice he ordered the lifeboats on the quarter deck lowered the women and children were placed in the ship's cutter a small boat the stress Rockets were fired but there were no vessels nearby to see 60 men were detailed to go below and operate the chain pumps to pump water out of the hole and 60 more Were Meant to man The Tackle on the two large lifeboats each able to carry 150 people but when they pulled on the tackle to lift the lifeboats the ropes broke the equipment hadn't been maintained the ropes were rotten and the 150 person Boats were so heavy they could not be lifted on their own because of the tilts several other light boats couldn't be lowered and the birkenhead only had three operable lifeboats the cutter and two other small boats not nearly enough for everyone on board the ranking officer on board Lieutenant Colonel Seaton of the 74th foot arranged the remaining soldiers to stand in ranks on the poop deck using their weight to lift the bow of the ship in the pitch black emergency the men maintained their discipline Captain Salman ordered the engines in Reverse thinking he could pull off the rocks it was a mistake she struck again on the stern and tore another gash it flooded the engine room and killed the boilers the men sent below to man the pumps were instantly drowned as the ship broke in half salmon ordered the horses thrown overboard in the hopes that they could swim for sure eight of the nine made it then salmon gave a final order all the men who could swim should jump off and swim for the lifeboats but that's where the story takes its extraordinary turn Colonel Seton realized that all the men swimming were way too much for the small lifeboats at Sea and so he shouted to his men the cutter with the women and children it will be swapped I implore you not to do this thing I ask that you stand fast and so they did they stood bravely at attention as the ship broke up around them in what became known as the birkenhead drill one of the few officers to survive the disaster Captain Edward Wright of the 91st regiment wrote of that moment everyone did as was directed and there was not a murmur a cry among them all received their orders and carried them out as if they were embarking instead of going to the bottom put Roger Kipling immortalized the moment in his poem Soldier and sailor 2. but to stand and hold still to the birkenhead drill is a damned tough bullet to chew but they did it the jollies Her Majesty's jollies Soldier and sailor II the birkenhead sunk within 25 minutes of striking the first rock many were sucked down with the ship and many more were horribly taken by the great white sharks which are prolific off of danger point the next day the Schooner lioness discovered the cutter with the women and children and rescued everyone who had been in lifeboats they returned to the scene of the wreck and found 40 more survivors still clinging to the wreckage about another hundred had managed to make it to shore out of 638 on the birking head 193 survived including all of the women and children several other ships foundered off of danger Point that's how it got its name but it wasn't until 1885 that a lighthouse was built to warn ships of the reef the birkenhead is the first known example of using the protocol Women and Children First when loading lifeboats but interestingly that is not actually codified in maritime law although still to this day the general protocol is to Aid the most vulnerable first the injured the elderly children the conduct of the soldiers aboard the birkenhead became known as a model for discipline and self-sacrifice it so impressed the Emperor of Prussia Frederick William IV that he had an account of the conduct aboard the birkenhead read out to every regiment in his army there are several monuments to the victims of the birkenhead both in England and in South Africa and the people of Guns by South Africa still hold a memorial every year a memorial to remember people who deserve to be remembered because of their sacrifice for others 113 years ago today on June 15 1904 one of America's worst Maritime disasters occurred in New York City's East River the fire aboard the passenger steamer General Slocum is generally not as well remembered as other disasters of the era like the sinking of the Titanic or the shirt waste factory fire but it shouldn't be the disaster on the general Slocum changed Maritime policy it transformed the neighborhoods of New York and its victims deserve to be remembered the passenger steamer General Slocum was a side wheel Steamboat built in Brooklyn New York in 1891. she had a keel of 235 feet and was constructed of white oak and yellow pine she had one engine fed by two boilers and was propelled by two 31 foot diameter paddle wheels on both sides she was named after Civil War General Henry Warner Slocum who commanded the Union right at the Battle of Gettysburg and later represented New York state in the U.S House of Representatives the general Slocum had three decks and was licensed for 2500 passengers it had had some mishaps in its day several times it had grounded on sand banks twice it had collided with other vessels and in 1901 some drunken passengers had tried to take control of the steamship the crew fought them off 17 were arrested the ship was operated by the Knickerbocker Steamboat company and was generally used for day excursions it was built as the largest and most Splendid Excursion steamer in New York it had recently been overhauled and in May of 1904 had been inspected by the fire marshal who proclaimed its firefighting equipment in fine working order in 1904 the general Slocum was captained by 68 year old William Von check who had been cited for faring millions of passengers with an unblemished safety record large numbers of immigrants from Germany flowed into New York City in the 1840s and 1850s by 1855 New York City was third in the World Behind Berlin and Vienna for the largest German population in the city many of those immigrants congregated in a neighborhood in the Lower East Side of Manhattan that was called Little Germany the German population in the neighborhood quadrupled between 1845 and 1855. by 1870 Little Germany encompassed 400 square blocks Saint Mark's Evangelical Lutheran Church was a centerpiece of the Little Germany Community its parishioners included some of the most established families in the neighborhood on June 15th of 1904 Saint Marks had chartered the general Slocum for 350 for a day Excursion to the picnic grounds on Locust Point Long Island it was an annual end of school celebration the 17th held in a row and an exciting opportunity to escape the city for a day as it was a weekday the passengers were mostly women and children heavily weighted down with picnic baskets and looking forward to the exciting day it was a beautiful day out there was a German band playing on the deck and Saint Mark's beloved Reverend the Reverend George Haas was on Deck with his wife and daughter when she cast off the general Slocum was carrying about 1400 passengers the fire started in the lamp room towards the front of the ship possibly started by a discarded cigarette but it quickly spread in a room full of oily Rags the ship was passing 97th Street when the crew first noticed smoke coming up through the floorboards turns out that the crew had never done a fire drill and when they went to use the Fire Equipment they found out that it had not been maintained the hoses burst the fire was too big for them to fight one of the crew complained that it was like trying to put out hell itself the captain said that the blaze was the wildest he had ever seen the fire ripped through the wooden decks apparently further fueled by flammable paint the passengers had been given no instruction on how to abandon ship and it turns out that the lifeboats were similarly not maintained they had been wired and painted to the deck they burned before they could be lowered the life preservers had been hanging outside subject to the elements for 13 years when passengers grabbed them they disintegrated having broken down to nothing but cork powder they sank like rocks like most Americans of the time very few of the passengers could swim and they were weighted down by their wooling clothes the decks collapsed in the fire throwing people into the fire or crushing them Reverend Haas as the fire reached them jumped overboard with his wife and daughter they they hung on for a while but all the people jumping off knocked them apart and they were separated his Burns were so bad that he had to sit behind a screen at his wife's funeral a week later his daughter was among the last of the bodies to be identified one newspaper described it as a spectacle of horror beyond words to express a great vessel All In Flames sweeping forward in the sunlight within sight of the crowded City while her helpless screaming hundreds were roasted alive or swallowed up in waves Captain Von Shake tried to steer towards a wharf but he was waved off by a tugboat the fear was that the Flames would spread to Lumber and oil drums that were stored on the dock and so instead he steered towards north brother Island about two miles away was an island that held a hospital for infectious diseases the captain's Hope was to be able to ground the Slocum on her side so that the passengers could get off and so he kept her going at Full Steam holding onto the wheel even as his own clothes caught fire the wheels were spinning so fast that some passengers they jumped off they were crushed by them and the speed of the boat only fanned the flames and made it worse when she grounded she didn't ground on her side she grounded on her bow which meant that the rear of the belt where most of the passengers had gone to escape the Flames was still over 25 feet of water with a deadly tide in the end only 321 of the people aboard the general Slocum survived bodies washed up on shore for days after but only around 600 were recovered more than 400 were never found it was the deadliest disaster in the history of New York City up until 9 11 in 2001. in 1906 a memorial Fountain was installed in Tompkins Square Park it's inscription read they are Earth's purest children Young and fair Captain Von shake and the principal officers of the Knickerbocker Steamboat company were all indicted for failure to maintain the safety equipment but the captain was the only one that was ever taken to trial he was acquitted of manslaughter but he was convicted of criminal negligence and given a sentence of 10 years he was pardoned due to his age by President Taft in 1912. the disaster board the general Slocum led to significant changes in Maritime regulations regarding the maintenance of Emergency Equipment it transformed the industry the neighborhood of little Germany was already somewhat in decline in 1904 really a result of its own success many of the residents had become successful enough to move Uptown but after the general Slocum disaster the neighborhood fitted quickly there were funerals held for weeks and after that was followed by depression and several suicides there wasn't a family in the neighborhood that wasn't touched by the disaster and it seems that with the fire aboard the Slocum the heart of the neighborhood simply went away Little Germany faded in 1940 the Evangelical Lutheran Church was converted into a synagogue representing the change in demographics in the neighborhood and while Little Germany is gone the victims of the fire aboard the general Slocum still deserve to be remembered more than three and a half million Americans served in the United States Navy during the second world war the expansion of the U.S Navy during the war was astounding the Navy added thousands of ships by the end of the war the United States Navy accounted for more than 70 percent of the entire world's number and gross tonnage of Naval vessels over a thousand tons and what we tend to focus on the warships we forget that millions of those Sailors served above the Navy's thousands and thousands of Supply supports and auxiliary ships and that those men also risked their lives even if they weren't in Frontline combat the November 1944 explosion of the ammunition ship USS Mount Hood barely even acknowledged by the Navy at the time was illustrative of those risks it is history that deserves to be remembered the ship that would eventually be named USS Mount Hood was laid down originally on September 28 1943 as SS Marco Polo built by the North Carolina shipbuilding company in Wilmington North Carolina the ship was a type C2 vessel design created by the U.S Maritime Commission in 1937 and 1938 these all-purpose cargo ships had five holds and a design speed of 15.5 knots the ship was built on a contract for the U.S Maritime commission and independent agency of the federal government established in 1936 and intended to facilitate a merchant shipbuilding program 172 type C2 vessels were built in U.S shipyards between 1938 and 1975. renamed Mount Hood after the mountain in the Cascade Range in Oregon on November 10th the ship U.S Maritime commission hole number 1358 was launched November 28th like many C2 ships the Mount Hood was taken into the U.S Navy on a lone Charter basis that meant the ship would be operated by the Navy but the title would still be held by the maritime Commission the idea was that after the war the ship would revert to the maritime commission and could be sold to private interests to facilitate Merchant shipping many ships acquired by the Navy on a lone Charter basis were specifically modified for Navy use Mount Hood was one of those modified ships converted into an ammunition ship type c2-s-aj aj1 the first of her class at the Norfolk Navy yard by the Norfolk ship building and Dry Dock company ammunition ships are cargo vessels specifically designed to carry ammunition for naval ships and aircraft as modified the USS Mount Hood displaced 13 910 long tons was 459 foot 2 inches long with a beam of 63 feet and a draft of 28 foot 3 inches the ship had a cargo capacity of 7 700 deadweight tons and a complement of 267 officers and Men the USS Mount Hood was commissioned on July 1st 1944 after a brief cruise for Shakedown and fitting out was assigned to the Pacific was loaded with ammunition in Norfolk Virginia departed August 21st transited the Panama Canal six days later and arrived at seidler Harbor in the admiralty Islands on September 22nd seedler Harbor is located on Manus Island the largest island of the admiralty Islands an archipelago group to the north of New Guinea in the South Pacific Ocean the amulti islands had been administered as part of German New Guinea from 1884 to 1914. seedler means sea eagle in German and the harbor was named after a German ship the admiralty Islands were occupied by the Japanese at the outset of the war and had been liberated in a hard-fought campaign under general Douglas MacArthur in the spring by September seedler Harbor had been transformed into a large base including wharves and an air base that served as a staging area for further World War II operations in New Guinea and the Philippines at the time of USS Mount Hood's arrival seedler Harbor was utilized as a major side of repair and logistical support for ships participating in the Philippine Invasion and those operating in the South Pacific area according to the Navy Board of Investigation the busy Harbor regularly included between 200 and 600 ships the Mount Hood was used as a primary source of issue of ammunition to all types of ships of the U.S third Fleet the ship was described as extremely active delivering ammunition to ships in all parts of the harbor and was frequently called upon to issue ammunition to combatant ships on short notice the Navy Board of Investigation noted that speed of transferring ammunition was ever of prime necessity because of this critical role the Mount Hood was moved from a less congested part of the harbor that had been reserved for ammunition ships to a more Central birthing this represented a risk as it meant that many more ships would be in close proximity to a ship that was literally packed with ordnance but a discussion by the Squadron ordinance officer the Harbormaster and the captain of the Mount Hood determined that the need to quickly Supply ammunition was more important the central Anchorage lessened the distances needed to supply ammunition to other ships and facilitated communication with the staff of the service Squadron the purse also placed Mount Hood in the smoothest water possible and allowed a cruiser to be placed alongside the Mount Hood for ammunition transfer the morning on November 10th naval Reserve Lieutenant Lester Wallace the mount Hood's communication officer went ashore with 13 enlisted men another four enlisted men went ashore in a second boat Wallace said to pick up new communication manuals and other Publications the other men also had errands some had Dental appointments some were visiting the base chaplain some were male clerks picking up the mail two men were being taken to the base Brig to face court-martial the men arrived on Shore at around 8 30 in the morning the Mount Hood was already busy with several small boats alongside already transferring ammunition at the time Mount hooded approximately 3 800 tons of ammunition on board including 250 500 and thousand pound bombs as well as fuses Rockets smokeless powder and ammunition and projectiles of numerous sizes the primary method of transferring ammunition was with the small boats called lending craft mechanized or lcms these 50-foot open top shallow draft vessels were designed to carry vehicles but were also used to carry stores that morning there are at least nine lcms alongside Mount Hood along with a pontoon lighter each loading or unloading various types of Ordnance the ship was busy and the hatches of all five holes were open and working the day was described as bright and sunshiny when 29 year old Lieutenant Wallace and the sailors of Mount Hood were walking along the beach to the base Wallace said that one of the sailors with a startled look in his eye shouted look and pointed seaward there was a bright flash two quick explosions the investigation determined that around 8 55 a.m an explosion evidenced by Flame and smoke amid chips near number three or four hold Rose to above Mast height within a few seconds at the most the report concluded most of the ammunition aboard USS Mount Hood was set off USS Hagan the flagship of the commander of service Squadron 10 448-foot floating headquarters of the service Fleet at seidler lay moored to a boy at Birth 14 1100 yards away argon's Captain Commander t h Ascot was outside his cabin when Mount Hood exploded I was standing outside my cabin in conversation with executive officer by the time we recovered our stance from the force of the explosion and faced outboard the area in the vicinity of birth 380 where Mount Hood had Lane moored was completely shrouded to Nepal of dense black smoke it was not possible to see anything worth reporting a second or so Hereafter fragments of Steel and fractal became falling on and around the ship though some 4 500 yards away Wallace and the men on Shore were thrown to the ground they rushed up and ran back to their small boat Wallace reported we headed for the Mount Hood but we found nothing but debris so we went back and reported to the commander of the base what we'd seen and helped him as much as we could to determine what happened the review board reported a terrific explosion occurred smoke obscuring the ship and surrounding vicinity for a radius of 500 yards in all sides the smoked mushroom to a height approximately seven thousand feet when it had lifted from the waters a few minutes later only small pieces of debris were to be seen the ship had disappeared and by disappear the report meant simply gone the largest piece of the more than 400 foot long vessel that has ever been found was a piece of hole that was some 16 foot by 10 foot the lcms alongside were also disintegrated no human remains were ever found officially 327 men Mount Hood's crew the crews of small vessels nearby and other sailor Stone overboard and never recovered were listed as missing Wallace and the 17 men who had been unsure at the time of the explosion and just one other man who had been aboard another ship and had been injured were all that was left of Mount Hood's crew Mount Hood's Anchorage had been at about 19 fathoms or around 114 feet above the ocean bottom and yet the explosion was so powerful that it dug a crater in the bottom of the ocean a thousand feet long 200 feet wide between 30 and 40 feet deep men on short two and a half miles away were thrown to the ground and the ship rained trapped on unexploded Ordnance and all the ships around it doing severe damage to every ship within about two thousand feet and damaging some ships that were as far away as 6 500 feet Argonne took substantial damage from the falling debris including two men killed Ascot noted some 221 pieces of debris renting in size from 1 to 150 pounds recovered on board totaling 1300 pounds the ship's 12-inch Searchlight was destroyed five transmitting attendants broken away and steam fresh water and saltwater lines ruptured as well as taking extensive damage from a concussion the John C Butler class Destroyer Escort USS overrender was 1100 yards away from Mount Hood flaming debris ran down on the ship killing one sailor outright and knocking another overboard was never recovered and listed among the missing 17 members of huberinder's crew were injured the ship was so badly damaged suffering two large holes in the hole and many punctures above and below the water line as well as damage to the wiring piping systems and topside equipment that had to be towed to dry dock and spend the rest of the month in repairs three crew members were killed and 70 were wounded aboard the attack cargo ship USS Elena 25 of them seriously Elena herself suffered extensive damage above decks which necessitated some six weeks of repair work the story of one of Elena Sailors injured in the explosion William Knight was described in a memoir written later by his son white hot shards of Steel fragmentation embedded themselves in his head knocking him out of the Gunner's position the force of the shrapnel injury sent him sprawling over the deck and he vaguely heard someone scream Corman just before everything went black the injury eventually required 120 days of hospitalization William Knight's severe injury was an example of the random nature of the death and entry that came from the falling debris it was traumatic event in the life of a man who well lived a traumatic life the name William Knight was actually a false name that was intended according to the research done by his son to hide the name of his real father gangster Al Capone the random nature of the shrapnel was also shown aboard the Destroyer tender USS Piedmont although some 3 500 yards away a 250 pound aerial bomb penetrated the movie Locker on the boat deck while another pierced the folks hole in plowed through a tear of bunks amazingly neither bomb exploded and no one was injured in either compartment but one man was killed when he was hit directly on the head by the base of a five-inch ammunition shell but by far the worst damage was done to the luzon-class internal combustion engine repair ship USS Mindanao just 350 yards away and broadside to the blast in between Mount Hood and USS Argonne Mindanao was ripped by the explosion in shrapnel All crew members who were topside were killed outright and many more were killed and wounded below deck a fleet of small vessels attended the ship's crew and damage minda now suffered 23 killed and 174 wounded in the explosion a member of Mount Hood's crew Lieutenant Wilfred D Colley was aboard Mindanao was among those killed his were the only remains of Mount Hood's crew that could be identified in all 26 ships and 33 smaller vessels were damaged in addition to those destroyed in the explosion the Navy estimated that repairs required more than 107 thousand man hours 45 men were known killed 327 were listed as missing and another 371 injured the 743 casualties represented the second worst Pacific fleet-based Disaster of the war second only to Pearl Harbor because of wartime restrictions the Navy didn't even acknowledge the explosion of the Mount Hood until December 5th and even then the report didn't talk about the severity of the damage it merely read the 13 733 ton ammunition ship Mount Hood was lost when it accidentally blew up at an advanced base in the Central Pacific the Navy established a review board to discover the cause of the explosion Lieutenant Wallace is the senior Survivor of USS Mount Hood was interviewed but couldn't offer much detail about the explosion he noted that conditions appeared to be normal when I left the ship he concluded I guess no one will ever know what really happened she just blew we'd never had an explosion of any kind on the Mount Hood before that the review concluded that the explosion has not been caused by enemy action well the exact cause could not be determined the report concluded since the possibility of enemy action appears to have been remote the most probable cause of the accident was rough handling of the ammunition while loading or unloading the report identified many errors in ammunition handling aboard the Mount Hood noting the ship had a relatively inexperienced crew that there was a lack of leadership among the officers and a lack of discipline among the crew the report also criticized placing the ship in such a central location rather than putting it in a more remote location that was reserved for ammunition ships but Admiral Chester Nimitz commander-in-chief of the United States Pacific Fleet and Pacific Ocean areas refused to concur with any funding faulting the officers involved saying that the technical mistakes made by the officers were errors in judgment resulting from a keen desire to meet necessary military commitments and move on with the progress of the war the exigencies of War will always require the acceptance of certain operational hazards nimitz's fighting may have been intended to protect the reputations of the officers who died the report went so far as to censor out the names of the officers involved in addition to emphasizing the already existing rules for ordinance handling the report gave three specific recommendations one wherever practicable ammunition ships should be birthed at least 1 100 yards from other ships and installations two an effort should be made to maintain a level of internal organization and administration to a standard higher than that which apparently existed aboard USS Mount Hood and three that Port regulations require regular inspection and supervision of ammunition ships and thus the explosional board Mount Hood was barely reported written off as an operational hazard and the war went on [Music] [Applause] [Music] June 30th 1900 what was described as a slight fire and a bale of cotton quickly spread into what newspapers dubbed the Hoboken horror The Great dox Fire of Hoboken New Jersey in 1900 killed hundreds of people did millions of dollars in damage and underlined some unique risks of the era of the great ocean liners it is history that deserves to be remembered the city of Hoboken is located on the Hudson River Waterfront across from Manhattan where it was an integral part of the port of New York and New Jersey until the middle 20th century when container shipping facilities rendered the docks obsolete the name Hoboken was derived from a native Lenape name for the area but was also impacted by 19th century Dutch immigrants leaking the name of the city to a district of Antwerp in 1900 it was a bustling Port City of some 59 000 people Hoboken was the Western Terminus of several railroads and a huge amount of cargo into the Hudson Waterfront the economic engine of the city a quarter mile that Waterfront was occupied by the docks of the german-based Deutsche Lloyd the second largest shipping company in the world ndl operated some of the world's greatest liners at the time including a thriving passenger service carrying European immigrants to American ports like Hoboken liners of the ndl line were often docked at Hoboken the indiel docks and warehouses brimmed with various types of cargo including bales of cotton and barrels of various industrial liquids such as oil and turpentine the fire on the last day of June 1900 started in bales of cotton the New York World reported the evening of the fire a bale of cotton appear two of the north German Lloyd's long deck suddenly burst into flames the flammability of cotton has been researched many times the flammability of bales of cotton has actually been demonstrated to be quite low especially if densely packed a 1954 report by the British Department of scientific and Industrial Research and fire offices committee joint fire research organization concluded that spontaneous ignition of cotton Bales is unlikely however the report notes cotton Bales may be ignited by the usual accidental sources such as careless smoking and Sparks from locomotives in addition friction and impact between the steel ties and adjacent Bales and the fracture of ties has been cited as causes of frequent fires which occurred during the carriage of cotton Bales by rail in the United States what's more a bail that has been ignited might smolder for a good deal of time the report talks about so-called hot Bales which have small locks of cotton that have been ignited in the Gin by friction or Sparks have escaped detection these so-called fire packed or hot Bales may continue to smolder in the interior for days or weeks without any outward sign of fire until eventually the smoldering reaches the surface and breaks into Flame it isn't known exactly how the bill of cotton on the MDS dot caught fire that day an investigation by the bremerhaven board of shipping reported in the New York Times the following February concluded that the cause of the outbreak could not be precisely ascertained but was probably carelessness the world noted that the fire was discovered at four o'clock but may have been spoldering for some time whatever spark ignotted the Bales the fire once noticed spread quickly the year times wrote without a warning a fire started in the midst of the cotton about one-third at way out on the pier and the strong wind instantly fanned the little flame into a roaring devouring Blaze the world reported the huge shed was piled high with cotton ready for shipment and there were hundreds of barrels of oil in an instant the flame would flash along the cotton Bales as if by a train of powder reaching the oil it burst into a Roar and Barrel after Barrel exploded the New York evening graphic wrote crowded with merchandise of every description the dock buildings light wooden structures burnt like Tinder barrels of oil and Spirits exploded and spread the fire to the shipping the San Francisco call reports that in less than 15 minutes the Flames covered in area a quarter of a mile long extending outward from the actual Shoreline to the bulkheads from 600 to a thousand feet away the times reported that an alarm was turned impromptly by the policeman on the pier and the Hoboken firemen were on the ground within three minutes after the discovery of the fire but it gained Headway with such incredible rapidity that the three peers of the north German Lloyd line were already Beyond saving the world opined the destruction of the north German Lloyd's immense plant seemed almost inevitable and the local fire department was unable to cope with the Flames even with the assistance of the Navy of tugboats that quickly came from all parts of the river and harbor to Aid the fire moves so quickly that workers on the pier were cut off from Escape the Bamberg South Carolina Herald revealed that there were great gangs of workmen on the piers and these together with the number of people who were at the docks on business and visiting the ships scattered in all directions is all means of exit were cut off by the Flames they were forced to jump overboard and it's believed that a great number were drowned the San Francisco call goes on crowds of dock labors and also employees of the companies were on all the peers the people and the peers jumped into the water to save themselves and scores have been huddled under the piers clinging to the supports only to be suffocated by the Flames or to drop back into the water from exhaustion the scale of the tragedy was quickly obvious the account in the graphic said few calamities in the states can buy with the sudden loss of life awful scenes and Swift destruction of property which marked the last day of June in New York in the bright Summer Sunshine looking across the Hudson a sudden Whirlwind of smoke told of an immense conflagration the next day the Indianapolis Sunday General read those who gathered along the shores of the Hudson River to witness the fire so I spectacle they will never forget and it will have a place in the history of New York the description in the San Francisco call sounded nearly apocalyptic River and Bay were enveloped in a Pall of black smoke through which angry Flames bursting was from volcanoes on the Jersey Shore and in the water itself leap like red spheres into the sky but the fire on the docks was only the beginning as the fire reached the ships at the Docks the Bamberg Herald of Bamberg New Jersey reported at the Docks at the North German Lloyd were the Salah a single screw passenger ship of 4965 gross tons the Bremen a two-screw freight and passenger ship of 10 526 tons and the main a twin screw Freight and passenger ship of 10 200 gross tons but the largest ship at the NDS docks was the 14 349 ton Kaiser Wilhelm de grossa generally considered to be the world's first super liner and holder at the time of the blue ribbon for the world's fastest transatlantic Crossing the fire occurred when the ship's coal-fired steam engines were cold and they did not have time to build up steam and move under their own power as the blaze roared they needed tugboats to pull them from the Flaming piers the fire occurred on a Saturday considered a half holiday and therefore none of the ships were prepared for departure the timing was fortunate as the weekly insurance register noted on July 3rd had the fire occurred when one of the ships was about to sail the loss of life would have been far greater the fire moved quickly to the ships the times reported the strong wind almost in an instant carried the Flames across the narrow strip of water into the cabins of the Saleh crushed Pier 2 to seize hold of the Bremen Elite thence to the Kaiser wilham degrosa and catching Pier 1 on their folds laid hold on the main the river was full of tugs and the Kaiser Wilhelm to grossa was the first of the Steamers they pulled from the pier the times described the rescue the first ship to get clear of the burning Pier was the Kaiser wilham degrosa aboard which were many visitors at the first Cry of fire the visitors were hurried ashore by the officers of the steamship and the crew summoned to their post cut the boat loose but there was not enough steam to move up the great vessel and it was not until the tugs president and Sarah E Easton made fast at the stern that the vessel began moving slowly out of its nest of fire with its outer woodwork Ablaze the ship was almost stuck but for the quick action of a crewman the times continued the last man to escape from Pier One was Eric Sorensen Seaman on the Kaiser Wilhelm to grossa a single steel Hauser overlooked in the excitement held the vessel and sliding down to the burning Pier he loosened it and dashed it safely through a passageway of fire amid the cheers of the firemen although she was already on fire in several places the Great Liner was largely undamaged despite the loss of two Sailors in the scullery man the damage was light the times coated the ship's Captain Heinrich Engelbert we were very lucky a thousand dollars will cover the damage to this ship will be expended principally for paint we will sail tomorrow as advertised but the Bremen Salah and Maine did not fare so well while the flames on the Kaiser Wilhelm de grossa were extinguished with little difficulty after slight damage the world noted the solid though was a fire from stem discern which was freed from her Moorings the graphic described the Dismal scene far different was the fate of the other vessels the Cella floated Downstream and is stranded on the mud of the Weehawken Shore the main and the Bremen were towed Upstream on a similar plate dismantled wrecks the scenes during a wild fight with the Flames were horrible so sudden and startling was the outbreak that scores of the crews were imprisoned under the decks of the burning Steamers comparatively few escaped in a marvelous fashion after some hours the decks were strewn with the bodies of those who succumbed to the fierce heat which speedily made Iron and Steel red hot the numbers of others leapt into the water only to meet death by drowning the fires were so hot that the Leader Telegram of Eau Claire Wisconsin reported that of the many dead no Trace can or will ever be found their bodies haven't been reduced to ashes in the furnace the first officer of the Salah a man named Schaefer was quoted in the New York Times I made for the lower deck when I reached there I saw nothing but fire was raging everywhere red black horrible the smoke almost blinded me but at last I shouted orders to cut loose to Moorings by that time the fire was everywhere it's getting too hot for us to stay aboard so we jumped over the sides many were caught below decks where the portholes were too small to allow escape the times quoted U.S Navy rear Admiral George Melville who boarded one of the tugboats he said as we approached the seller's side we saw numerous persons between the burning decks above and also between the bulkheads of the lower decks trying to get through the miserable little airports or deadlights not more than eight or nine inches in diameter the times describe the horror witnessed by one of the tugboat Crews suddenly a naked arm emerged from the hole and a voice shattered something in German none of the boatmen understood the words but the murky red fire that formed a background to the arm told them that its owner was burning slowly to death the San Francisco call summarized the scene at the end of the day and through the poll of smoke a great Crimson Sun at large to Thrice its size by the haze glared like an enormous eye as it slowly sank in the West such was the tremendous spectacle presented on the surface of the Hudson River as if it had been some holiday pageant it was made tragic by the realization that in that smoke and beneath the turbid waters scores of lives had been lost or were in their last desperate struggle against death hospitals were overrun with the wounded the dead were difficult to count the city General reported all the hospitals in Hoboken in this city are crowded with the victims of the fire their scores of men burned so badly that little hope is entertained for their recovery the Salah eventually sank when it was refloated the remains of 99 charred victims were recovered the final number will never be known but at least 326 people were known to have died the indialed docks were burned to the water the graphic reported of the north German Lloyd's peers in which the buildings were erected only charred stumps remain several other buildings docks and warehouses were either burned or destroyed by fire crews in order to stem The Blaze damages were estimated to be in the Millions in an astounding Discovery 16 coal Tremors who had hidden in a coal bunker aboard the SS Maine were discovered alive and rescued after seven hours in what the New York Times described as a veritable oven a naval Board of inquiry in Germany faulted the New York City tugboats who they claimed were uncooperative and refused various requests for assistance had they been more Cooperative the board argued the loss of life and property could have been reduced ndl rebuilt the docks using state-of-the-art techniques said to make them practically non-combustible and giving ndl according to the New York Times new piers and terminals which will give the company docking facilities Superior to those of any transatlantic line touching this port and unsurpassed in any part of the world the liners Bremen Maine and Salah were all refloated rebuilt and returned to service although the Salah was rebuilt only as a cargo vessel and renamed the SS JL lukenbach a New Jersey Coroner's jury found that many tugs put profitable Salvage above saving lives the Elmira New York star Gazette said of the juries we are of the opinion from the evidence before us that the loss of life at the time by Drowning would have been lessened if some of the tugboat employees in the vicinity had devoted more time to saving life than the looking for games by Salvage but the names of none of the brutal commanders could be learned despite some opposition from shipbuilders after the Hoboken fire new ships generally were required to be built with portals that were at least 11 inches by 13 inches to more realistically facilitate Escape on the first anniversary of the Hoboken disaster a granite Memorial that listed the names of the dead and missing was placed over a mass grave of unidentifiable remains in Flowery Hill Cemetery in North Bergen New Jersey

Channel: The History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered

Views: 147,216

Keywords: history, history guy, the history guy

Id: hzPrDZxPzVY

Length: 58min 44sec (3524 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 12 2023