Heritage

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A small crowd turned out for the open house Monday (Nov. 21) at the Walker House Heritage Centre, Kincardine, to see new artifacts from the "Erie Belle" steamship which blew up in Lake Huron, off the Kincardine coastline, 128 years ago.

Most of the items were discovered by Carl La France, a scuba diver who spent his youth in Kincardine and now lives in St. Thomas.

He has been searching the site of the wreck of the "Erie Belle" and said there is a lot of debris over a wide area, lying on the bottom of the lake, exactly as it was the day the ship blew up.

"The wreck of the 'Erie Belle' is not like what you see on TV where the diver goes down and the boat is basically intact," he said. "Other than the boiler on the beach (just south of Kincardine), and the keel al little off shore, the rest of the boat at the blast site was literally blown to bits. The largest piece is two feet square. It's comparable to an airliner crash where debris is scattered everywhere."

Rick Farquhar wrote a history of the ship: "Erie Belle - the Life and Death of a Steamship," which was published in 2007, the 125th anniversary of the explosion, with illustrations by local artist Betty Sanjana. The book is available at the Walker House at a cost of $10 per copy.

Citing recollections from James Gardiner ("Jimmy the Bear"), Farquhar tells the story of the final days of the "Erie Belle" before the ship blew up on Nov. 21, 1883.

At the time, the "Erie Belle" was a tug boat and was sent to pull another ship, the "J.N. Carter," off some rocks and a shoal.

It was snowing hard and Captain Tobin gave the order to build up steam for the hard pull the tug would need. With little luck in freeing the "Carter," engineer William Osgood charged the firemen to stoke it up more still. More heat, more steam, more pressure, harder work for the engine.

Then there was a burst of light, a roar of noise and a blast of cold air and the "Erie Belle" had blown apart.

"Madness and wreckage and screams and cold wind were all around," recalled Gardiner. "And nothing I ever knew from that moment on could ever be the same. It was chaos for sure."

Osgood died instantly, as did his second engineer Frank Eikenhurst. Also dead were one of the firemen and the cook.

"But the 'Erie Belle' no longer exists ... except for her boiler, which sits in the sun, and the rain, and the snow, and the heat of the summer," recalled Gardiner. "What was left of the rest of her rolled onto the shore and was atomized by the surf and the rocks. A sad end for a ship of 21 years ..."

The following are the "Erie Belle" artifacts donated to the Walker House Heritage Centre:

The COMPASS was found 850’ NW from the centre of the explosion. It would have been mounted in a wooden box at the front of the wheelhouse with four walls and three floors between it and the boiler. The dint in the side shows the impact from flying debris. Ships still today use Ritchie compasses to keep them going in a straight direction at night, in bad weather, or out of sight of land.

The SHIP’S LOG of the "J.N. Carter" was found off the rocky point opposite the Boiler Beach pointing south. The "Carter" missed Kincardine harbour in a November, 1883, storm while towing this ship’s log. When they turned around, the log would have sunk to the bottom, where it got snagged on the rocks, tearing off three of its fins and slowing the ship considerably. This may have been the cause of the "Carter" being blown sideways onto the beach.

The RIGGING CHAIN was found near the centre of the blast site of the "Erie Belle." The large ring was used as a handle to open the fire doors on the boiler.

The CLINKER is from the boiler fire on the "Erie Belle" and was found at the centre of the explosion. When coal is burned, impurities fuse together to form clinkers. The lower the grade of coal, the more clinkers, and low-grade coal was often used in boilers because it was cheaper.

The HORSESHOE was found off Station Beach. The pioneers weren’t worried about pollution and threw anything they didn’t want into the lake.

The HULL PLANKING SPIKE from the "George R. Clinton" is typical of all the wooden schooners built in the 1800s. A square spike is a sure sign that it came from a shipwreck.

The STEAM VENT was found 900’ NE from the centre of the explosion of the "Erie Belle." It was mounted near the top of the smoke stack. A pressure release valve would open with any excess pressure causing steam to go up a pipe and out this steam vent. Unfortunately the pressure release valve failed and the pressure built to the point that the boiler exploded. Writing around the bottom shows that it was made in Cleveland in 1879.

The CHAIN PLATE THROUGH BOLT from the "George R. Clinton" went through the hull up by the railing and had a pulley attached that helped hold up the mast by means of a block and tackle.

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Sunday, November 27, 2011